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A 
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SHORT HISTORY OF FRANCE 

FOB 



YOUNG- PEOPLE. 



by/ 
MISS E. S. KIRKLAND; 

AUTHOR OF " SIX LITTLE COOKS," AND " DOHA'S HOUSEKEEPING." 






CHICAGO: 
JANSEN, McCLURG & CO. 

1879. 



COPTEIGHT. 

Jansen, McClxjkg & Co. 
A. D. 1878. 



STEREOTYF'ED AND PRINTEC 

BY THE 

CHICAQO LEQAL NEWS CO. 



^ 






TO 

ALL MY pupils: 

PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE. 



00]S"TE]S"TS. 



CHAPTER. PAGE. 

I. — Gaul befoke Christ, . . . . 7 

11. — Gaul under the Emperors, ... 15 
III. — Clovis, King op the Franks. A. D. 481 — 

511, 23 

IV. — The later Merovingians. 511 — 752, . 34 

V. — Pepin and Charlemagne. 752 — 814, . 43 

VI. — The later Carlovingians. 814 — 987, . 51 

VII.— The FIRST Capetians. 987—1108, . . 58 

VIII.— Louis VI. and his Son. 1108—1180, . 66 

IX.— Philip Augustus. Louis VIII. 1180— 

1226, 73 

X. — St. Louis. Philip the Bold, 1226 — 

1285, 81 

XI. — Philip the Fair and his Sons. 1285 — 

1328, 90 

XIL— Philip OF Valois. John the Good. 1328 

—1364, 99 

XIII.— Charles the Wise. 1364—1380, . .111 
XIV. — Charles the Well-beloved. 1380 — 

1422, 120 

XV.— Charles THE Victorious. 1422—1461, . 131 

XVI.— Louis XT. 1461—1483, .... 145 

XVIL— Charles VIII. Louis XII. 1483—1515, . 154 

XVIII.—Francis I. 1515—1547 165 

XIX.— Henry II. Francis II. 1547—1560, . 176 

XX.-Charles IX. Henry III. 1560—1589, . 186 

XXI.— Henry OF Navarre. 1589—1610, . . 198 

XXII.— Louis XIII. 1610—1643, . . . . 210 

XXIIL— Louis XIV. 1643—1715, .... 219 

XXIV.— To THE Peace of Nimeguen. 1678, . 230 

XXV.— To the Death op Louis XIV. 1715, . 240 

( ■) 



vi CONTENTS. 



XXVI.— Louis XV. 1715—1774 252 

XXVIL— The End OF A Bad Life. 1748—1774. . 260 

XXVIIL— Louis XVL 1774—1793, .... 269 

XXIX.— The French Revolution. 1789, . . 279 
XXX. — The Revolution, continued. 1789 — 

1790, 290 

XXXI. — From the Flight of the King to his 

Death. 1791—1793, ..... 299 

XXXII.— The Reign OF Terror. 1793—1794, . 311 
XXXIIL — The Directory. Day of the Sections. 

1795, 320 

XXXIV. — Bonaparte's First Campaigns. 1796 — 

1799, 328 

XXXV.— The Consulate. 1799—1804, . . .336 
XXXVI.-The Empire. 1804—1814, . . .345 

XXXVII. — From the Expedition' to Russia, to the 

Return FROM Elba. 1812 — 1815, . . 355 
XXXVIII. — The Hundred Days. To the Revolu- 
tion of July. 1815—1830, . . . 366 
XXllX.— Louis Philippe. 1830-1848, . . ' . 375 
XL.— The Second Empire. 1852—1870, . . 383 
The Third Republic. 1870, . . .391 



List of Kings, 397 



A 

SHORT HISTORY OF FRANCE 



FOR 



YOUlSra PEOPLE. 



CHAPTER L 



GAUL BEFORE CHRIST. 




T is hard to realize, as one travels now through 
fertile France and sees the well-tilled fields, 
noble cities, and vineyards heavy with their 
purple fruit, that it was once covered by tangled for- 
ests, whose only inhabitants were wild beasts and men 
nearly as savage as they. Indeed, one might almost 
have mistaken the man for the animal at a little dis- 
tance, for they both wore coverings of skins and never 
combed their hair; but when you saw the human being 
drinking out of a cup formed from the skull of his 
enemy, then 3'ou knew he must be a man, for wild 
beasts are not so reveno-eful. 

■ The old name for France was Gaul, and the people 
who lived there before the time of Christ are supposed 
to have come from Central Asia, and to have belonged 
to one of the fierce races called Celtic, which spread 
over the western part of Europe before history begins. 

(7) 



8 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

But all this is uncertain; and thouo;li the various 2:uesscs 
about it form an interesting stud}'-, we must limit our- 
selves now to what we can be sure of. Before going 
further, let me advise the young student always to 
have a map open before him while reading history. 
This will fix in his mind the situations of different 
places, and help him to make a sort of picture for 
himself of what was going on. 

About six hundred years before Christ, a ship con- 
taining a few Greeks from Phocea, a town in Asia 
Minor, which was itself settled from Greece, landed on 
the shore of a beautiful bay of the Mediterranean, in 
the south of what is now France. Being kindly 
received by the chief of a tribe of Gauls near by, they 
sent back to their native town for more settlers, and 
gradually built a city, to which they gave the name of 
Massilia, and which still exists as ^^kiarseilles. 

Of that part of Gaul which lay outside of this colony 
we know but little before the time of its conquest by 
Cgesar, but its inhabitants forced themselves on the 
notice of other nations at a much earlier date, by 
terrible invasions which made them the dread of their 
civilized neighbors. From time to time, they poured 
down into Italy, seeking in its fertile soil pasturage 
for the flocks and herds which saved them the trouble 
of tilling the ground; and more than once these 
barbarians burned the city of Rome itself. 

In the time of Alexander the Great, some of them 
wandered far enough to the East to meet with that 
famous warrior, to whom they offered their services in 
boastful language. He called them " swaggerers," but 
found them brave in battle, and after his death many of 



GAUL BEFORE CHRIST. 9 



than remained in the service of his generals. -It was 
not long, however, before they grew tired of fighting 
other people's battles, and determined to make war 
on their own account. A ferocious and insolent chief, 
ovhran^ whom the Romans called Brennus, and who 
had already done much mischief in Italy, resolved to 
pillage the rich shrine of Apollo at Delphi. He was 
successful in his first attack on the Greeks, but their 
natural spirit being roused, they joined together for 
a vio'orous defense and defeated him. 

O 

Upon this Brennus stabbed himself, leaving orders 
for his officers to cut the throats of their own wounded 
men, to prevent them from falling into the enemy's 
hands, and then to flee from the country with what 
soldiers they had left. This was done, and Greece 
was saved for that time. It was Brennus who first 
used the well known exclamation " Vse victis !" "Woe 
to the vanquished !" which so truly and terribly ex- 
pressed the state of those who fell into his power. 

It would be pleasant, if one had the time, to write a 
whole book about the doings of these strange people 
as they swept over one country after another, and to 
repeat all the stories, some true and some false, which 
are told of them by the nations whom they visited. 
But we must hasten back to Gaul itself, and can only 
take a glance at what its warriors did in foreig-n lands. 
The name of Galatia, in Asia Minor (to whose people 
St. Paul wrote one of his epistles), still reminds us that 
a colony of Gauls once settled there, and Galicia, in 
Spain, owes its name to the same cause. In Italy the 
Gauls forced the Romans to give them a district south 
of the Alps, which in later times was re-conquered by 



10 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Rome and called Cisalpine Gaul, Cis meaning " o: 
this side "; the country north of it was called Trans 
alpine, trans meaning "across," or "beyond." After 
ward Cisalpine Gaul was called Gallia Togata, becausi 
the inhabitants wore the Roman toga^ or gown; anc;. 
the other Gallia Braccata, from the breeches or short 
trowsers worn there. 

When the Romans made tbemselves masters of this 
province, they declared solemnly that the Alps were a 
barrier placed by nature between Italy and Gaul, and 
•pronounced a curse on whoever should attempt to 
cross it. In spite of this declaration, they soon began 
to cast their eyes towards the pleasant region of w^hich 
Massilia was the centre, and about a hundred and 
fifty years before Christ, an opportunity occurred of 
securing it, which was too tempting to be thrown away. 

The Massilians had become engaged in a struggle 
with the Gallic tribes around them, and finding 
themselves likely to get the worst of it, ajDplied to 
Rome for aid. It is the old story over again. The 
barbarians were driven away, but those who had come 
to help stayed to conquer, and slowly but surely the 
descendants of the Greek colonists found themselves 
transformed into subjects of the victorious Romans. 

The Gauls in the north had their own troubles. 
Having quarrelled among themselves, some of them 
called in the aid of Ariovistus, a German chieftain 
from beyond the Rhine. Unfortunate invitation ! 
Ariovistus came very willingly, and after conquering 
the enemy he proceeded to make himself master of 
those who had asked him for help. Immense num- 
bers of his countrymen poured into Gaul, as indeed 



GAUL BEFORE CHRIST. 11 

they had begun to do before this time, and the inhab- 
itants soon saw that they had only the choice of being 
enslaved by the barbarian or by the Roman. 

It is just at this point that Julius Caesar comes upon 
the scene. To us, who can see all that followed as 
well as what went before, it is plain that it would 
have been better for the German warrior to retire at 
once to his native forests, and occupy himself in hunt- 
ing wild beasts or fighting his fellow-countrymen; but 
he could not see this, and rushed headlong upon his 
fate. Trusting to his own skill, and the bravery of his 
soldiers, he insisted on giving battle to Caesar, who 
warned him to retire. His men fouo-ht like tisrers, but 
Roman discipline carried the day, and the barbarians 
were driven in disgrace across the Rhine, after losing 
fifty thousand men. Ariovistus was one of those who 
fled, but died soon afterwards, whether from his 
wounds or from rage and despair seems uncertain. 
Ceesar went on triumphantly in his career of conquest, 
and in a few years saw all Gaul at his feet, though the 
natives made some heroic efforts to save their country 
from slavery. 

There is a sad story of a young nobleman whom 
Caesar calls Vercingetorix, which in the Gallic lan- 
guage meant " chief of a hundred chiefs," who got 
together a great army of patriots while Caesar was 
away in Italy, and tried to drive the hated invader 
out of the country, but in vain. He showed not only 
wonderful courage and perseverance, but military 
skill also, which would astonish us if we did not know 
that the Gauls had been all this time learning from 
their enemies. At last there was nothing left for 



12 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

him to do but to give up, and being led into Caesar's 
presence, splendidly dressed, he knelt in silence at his 
feet, hoping no doubt that the great conqueror might 
tak6 pleasure in showing mercy, but Cgesar was too 
mnch irritated by the resistance he had met with to be 
magnanimous. Poor Yercingetorix was thrown into a 
'dungeon, and after years of weary captivity, was drag- 
ged from his prison to walk in chains behind Csesar's 
chariot at a triumph, and then led back to immediate 
execution. 

With his failure died the last hope of liberty for 
Gaul. From this time Caesar met with no serious 
trouble there, and spent his time in strengthening 
his government and trying to reconcile the natives 
to it. Nine years after his first entrance, during which 
time the invasion of Britain took place, most of the 
Roman soldiers were withdrawn, leaving only enough 
to secure their conquest. Nine terrible years they 
had been, marked by horrors which in these more 
peaceful times we can scarcely imagine, though war is 
always bad enough. The Romans did not know what 
mercy was, in treating those whom they had con- 
quered; and if we may believe their own writers, it 
was not uncommon for them, when they had taken a 
city, to put to death every creature they found within 
its walls, not sparing even the women and children. 

The people of Gaul had changed very much, as you 
may imagine, between the time when the Greeks first 
landed on their shores and that when Julius Cajsar 
saw them. They had learned to like bright colors in 
dress, arid to adorn themselves with heavy gold chains, 
bracelets and other ornaments. Their women must 



GAUL BEFORE CHRIST. 13 

have been quite skillful, for they wove gay plaids 
for their husbands' clothes, and made their cloaks in 
•true military fashion. 

These old Gauls looked very different from a 
modern Frenchman. They were tall and broad- 
shouldered, with fair complexion and blue eyes, and 
when thev went to battle their lono^ lig-ht hair and 
beards streamed in the wind, and must have been some- 
times rather in the way. They attached so much im- 
portance to keeping their bodies in good fighting order, 
that the youth who became fat was punished for fear 
it should make him lazy ; and to teach the soldiers to 
be in time, the last man who arrived when an army 
was assembling was put to death. One quality which 
we notice in these barbarians is their great pride, 
which led them to consider themselves superior to 
every body else. One of them said on seeing the 
closely packed ranks of Roman soldiers, " There is 
not a meal for my dogs !" But his dogs did not feed 
on the Romans nevertheless. 

The women of this long-haired nation (for so the 
Romans always speak of the Gauls), are described as 
being, if possible, fiercer in battle than their husbands 
and brothers-. When opposed to the enemy they 
gnashed their teeth, stretched out their necks and 
brandished their arms like windmills; then they would 
pound with their heavy fists in a way which few Roman 
skulls could withstand. It is related of their northern 
neighbors, the wives of the Oimbrians or Kyrari, that 
after a disastrous battle they were left at the mercy of 
the victors, andknowing well what such mercy was, they 
determined to take the matter into their own hands. 



14 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

They first killed all their children by strangling or 
crushing them; then they hanged themselves, or sought 
death in even more dreadful ways. After this the 
Romans had still an army of dogs to conquer, for 
these faithful creatures, furious as wolves, defended 
the bodies of the slain, until at leno-th not a livins: 

■'CD O 

creature remained to protest against their victory. 

The houses from which these warriors issued were 
not such as to tempt them to stay at home much of the 
time. They were made of wood or clay, and were 
somewhat like an old-fashioned bee-hive in shape, 
which would have done very well if there had been 
plenty of windows; but just imagine the only light 
and air they had coming in through the door! I should 
rather saj^- the door-hole, for doors to open and shut 
were the invention of a later time. But the Gauls 
were quick at learning, and by the time Cassar had 
done with them everything was changed. They 
adopted the Roman customs and habits, which were 
certainly more convenient than their own, and some 
of them even took the Roman names, so much 
smoother and shorter than theirs. One Vercundori- 
dub named himself after Julius Co3sar; — a change 
probably gratifying to the Romans though unflattering 
to the Gauls, — certainly amusing to us moderns. 

The religion of the Gauls was the Druid, the same 
which prevailed m Britain. You know from-reading 
English history what -this was; that with much that 
was noble the Druid priests mingled the horrible 
practice of human sacrifices, and that they were also 
law- givers and poets. They believed in a future life, and 
like our North America Indians, had horses, dogs, and 



GAUL UNDER THE EMPEROBS. 15 



sometimes even slaves burned on the funeral pile or 
buried with the dead man, that he might have proper 
attendants in the other world. Let us hope that they 
generally killed these poor victims first; but I fear 
that this was not always the case. 

The Gauls were in advance of modern savages in 
one respect; they had a great regard for women. One 
wife was enough for them, and they treated her with 
respect, even allowing her to give her opinion in their 
councils. In return, the Gallic wife seems to have 
worked for her husband with all her heart. She took 
care of his house, such as it was, fought b}'- his side in 
battle, and trained up his young warriors to the best 
of her ability, and if he gave her a beating occasionally, 
it was not for want of understanding her worth, but 
only that she might be suitably impressed with his 
dignity and kept in her proper position. 



GSAPTUB II, 



GAUL UNDER THE EMPEROES. 




HE history of Gaul for the next five hundred 
years shows us what was the course of things 
!1 wherever the Romans carried their victorious 
arms. The people, as soon as they had become accus- 
tomed to their new masters, adopted their habits and 
customs; and it was not long before Gaul began to 
rival Rome itself in the luxury of its wealthier inhab- 
itants. The nobles built superb palaces, filled with 



16 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

everything rare and costly, and spent their time in 
frivolous amusements or indolent repose. But all this 
had to be paid for by somebody, and the laboring 
classes were the source from which this ceaseless 
stream of wealth flowed, wruno^ from them amid siroans 
and bitter tears. 

So cruel were the demands made upon them, that 
to escape the exactions of their taskmasters they would 
fly from their country, or even sell themselves for 
slaves. But where could any one be out of the power 
of Rome? In all known lands she could pursue the 
wretched victim and force him back to his place, there 
to expiate, perhaps by the scourge or other torture, the 
crime of having dared to resist her will. The slaves 
alone felt no material difference; their condition had 
always been so miserable that it could scarcely change 
for the worse; their life and limbs were at the mercy 
of their owners as before, and though without hope 
of anything better, they had also no lower depth of 
misery to fear. 

Perhaps you will get a better idea of what was 
meant by Roman taxation if you read the words of 
an old Latin writer about it, than by any description 
of mine. He says : " The lands were measured out to 
the last clod ; trees and vines were counted ; every 
head of cattle was entered on the tax-list, every human 
beiijg was registered; nothing was heard but whips 
and cries of torment. The faithful slave was tortured 
to force him to depose against his master (to tell what 
property he had), the wife against her husband, the 
son ao-ainst his father. No excuse was admitted on 
the score of ag:e or sickness : meanwhile the animals 



GAUL UNDER THE EMPERORS. 



were diminishing, the men were dying off, and still the 
tax was exacted for the dead." 

You have read in the history of Rome what an im- 
portant part Gaul plays in the first centuries after 
Christ. Augustus, who had been reigning twenty- 
seven years at the beginning of the Christian era, lived 
for several years at Lugdunum (now called Lyons), 
which was then the capital of Gaul. The Emperor 
Claudius was" born there, and Caligula, the half-crazy 
and all-wicked tyrant, for some time made Gaul the 
scene of his mad freaks. Claudius was the most liberal 
and humane of all the emperors in respect to that 
province, and granted important privileges to the peo- 
ple. He was, however, very harsh toward the Druids, 
whom Augustus had previously humbled to a great 
extent; Claudius not only drove them out of Gaul, but 
pursued them into Britain, about a hundred years after 
the first invasion of that country by Julius Cassar. Up 
to this time the two religions — the Druidism of Gaul 
and the Paganism of Rome — had existed side by side; 
but after its priests were driven out, Druidism ceased 
to have any hold on the minds of the people, and a 
belief in the gods of Rome prevailed until the intro- 
duction of Christianity. 

Although the Romans were entirely masters of 
Southern Gaul, there still broke out, from time to time, 
some sparks of a desire for freedom elsewhere, fin 
Belgica, as the northern part was called, a man named 
Civilis undertook to raise a rebellion in the reign of 
the Emperor Vespasian. He induced many tribes to 
join him, and proclaimed Sabinus, a Gallic citizen, as 
emperor. When the rebellion was put down, Civilis, 
2 



18 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

who was a foreigner, was pardoned, but Sabinus, being 
a Roman subject, could expect no mercy, and con- 
cealed himself in some vaults in the neighborhood of 
his house. This was known to a faithful slave of his, 
who set fire to the house and then spread the report 
that his master had perished in the flames. When 
Eponina, the wife of Sabinus, heard this, she was 
nearly frantic; but learning the truth from the slave, 
she braved every danger in order to visit her husband 
in his hiding-place. He directed her to keep up the 
show of mourning for him, and she joined him in the 
vault, where they spent nine years together, cared for 
by their devoted servant. 

After the first few months, Eponina formed a plan 
of asking for pardon from the emperor, who was said 
to be more merciful than any who had been before 
him. So she had her husband's head and beard shaved, 
dressed him like a slave, and having disguised herself, 
they reached Rome safely. On arriving there, how- 
ever, the friends who were in the secret advised them 
not to trust themselves to the doubtful mercy of Ves- 
pasian, and they retired to their cellar and might have 
passed the rest of their lives there, happy in each 
other's society, but that on a second visit of Eponina 
to Rome she was discovered, and they were both taken 
prisoners. On being carried before the cruel Em- 
peror, Eponina threw herself at his feet, and showing 
him the two beautiful bovs who had been born while 
they were living in the cave, she begged forgiveness 
for her husband. It was of no use; Sabinus was con- 
demned to death, and Eponina, asking as a special 
favor that she might share his fate, was beheaded at 



GAUL UNDER THE EMPEROBS. 19 

the same time. The boys lived to be men, but could 
do nothing for their country, and the Gauls sank 
deeper and deeper into the degradation of slavery. 

But the time was com in o; when the truth which was 
to make them "free indeed" would dawn upon them 
and lio-hten their darkness, thous-h it was not without 
terrible experiences of the cruelty of man, that the 
believers in Christ's religion at last saw the end of the 
old and the triumph of the new. 

About a hundred and sixty years after Christ, some 
Christian missionaries from Asia Minor came to Gaul 
and settled at Lugdunum ; for a long time they were 
allowed to gather converts there, and many churches 
arose in the midst of heathen population. At length, 
however, the jealous passion of the latter, were aroused, 
and they felt a deep hatred towards the pure, simple 
minded people whose holy lives were a constant re- 
proach to their own self-indulgence. It was easy 
to start a persecution ; for sad to say, the better man 
an emperor was, the more he felt it necessary to punish 
those whom he considered enemies of the gods and 
therefore of true religion. So these saints, as we call 
them now, though they would not have given them- 
selves any such title, were subjected to every species 
of cruelty which the ingenuity of their enemies could 
invent, and most of them bore it all with a heroism 
far greater than was ever shown by a warrior on the 
field of battle. 

It must not be thought that the emperors were 
entirely responsible for all the horrors committed in 
these persecutions. They were told that the Christ- 
ians were wicked people, guilty of the most abomina- 



20 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

ble practices, and without giving themselves the 
trouble to inquire fully into the matter, thev gave 
general orders for punishing them. These orders 
vrere carried out often hundreds of miles av\ray from 
where the emperors were, and the brutal passions of the 
pagan mob added tortures to them which their authors 
never dreamed of. 

The church continued to be subject to persecutions 
for about a hundred and fifty years, though sometimes 
enjoying long periods of repose. Early in the fourth 
century the emperor Oonstantine declared himself a 
Christian, and the scattered and tormented churches 
soon formed a network over the land, scarcely to 
to be broken even by the wild wave of barbarism 
which with the invasion . of the Franks in the next 
century, again swept over the country. AYhen jou go 
to Paris, you will see, a little outside of the city, a hill 
called Montmartre, which means "Mountain of mar- 
tyrs;" and the old cathedral of St. Denis, not far off, 
was built in memory of the martyr Dionysius, who 
suffered there, and whose name gradually became 
shortened as you see. 

This cutting down of names is sometimes a little 
puzzling. One would not suspect that the modern 
town of Autun, in France, was at first called Augusto- 
dunum, in honor of the emperor Augustus. It is easier 
to recoo-nize in Orleans the name of Aurelian. But 
when we hear that the town of Aix was originally 
Aquse Sextiae (the waters of Sextius, so called because 
Sextius discovered the mineral springs there), our in- 
genuity is taxed to the utmost. The district in France 
called Provence, in which the town of Aix is situated, 



GAUL UNDER THE EMPERORS. 21 

naturally received its name from being the first Roman 
province. Not only these names of places, but also 
nearly all other French words are derived directly from 
the Latin. 

About two hundred and fifty years after Christ we 
first begin to hear of people called the Franks, a name 
given to many different tribes in Germany, who had an 
unpleasant habit of crossing the Rhine in great num- 
bers and fighting furiously with the people of Gaul. 
The Roman general Aurelian, afterwards emperor, was 
the first to meet these invaders and drive them back 
into their native forests, and his success delighted his 
countrymen so much that a song was made in his honor 
and sung by the soldiers. These are the only words 
of it which have come down to us : 

"Mille Francos, mille Sarmatas, semel occidiraus : 
Mille, mille, mille. mille Persas quserimus." 

"We have already killed a thousand Franks and a 
a thousand Sarmatians; we want a thousand, thousand, 
thousand, thousand Persians." This is the first time 
th.t the name of Franks appears in history, and Aure- 
lian perhaps thought it would be the last; but they 
were not so easily discouraged. They kept on coming 
and being driven back for the next two hundred years, 
each Emperor finding himself a little less able than 
the last to get rid of them. At last they grew so num- 
erous that there was no hope of dislodging them, and 
their presence in Gaul was accepted as a disagreeable 
necessity. 

But the Franks were not the only people destined 
to be the despair of the Romans in those unhappy 
days. Attila, the scourge of God ! What visions of 



22 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

horror does this name call up before us! We seem to 
see his hideous face, with its flat nose, dark skin, and 
ugly little eyes, his huge head on a short, stumpy 
body, his thin gray hair and straggling beard, — all these 
present themselves to our minds when we think of the 
savage who said of himself: " The stars fall at my 
approach; the earth trembles; I am the hammer of the 
universe!" How far this ferocious chief had traveled 
before he attacked the trembling nations who occupied 
Gaul we have no means of knowing, but the Huns, 
whom he commanded, started from that vast plain 
of Central Asia to which we give the general name 
of Scythia without kriowing its exact limits. The 
horrible cruelties practised by his soldiers, the ravages 
which marked his bloody path, the noble cities 
destroyed by his army, are subjects too painful to 
dwell upon, iSut at last the battle of Chalons put an 
end to his victorious career, and saved Western Europe 
from immediate destruction. This was one of the 
bloodiest combats ever fought. Such a trampling of 
human heads under horses' feet, such frantic slashing 
and hewing, have seldom been seen since men began 
to fight. The struggle lasted through a long June 
day, and so evenly were the armies matched that when 
night fell, no one could tell which side had won. 

In the morning, when the field of dead and dying 
lay revealed to view, it is no wonder that neither 
army cared to renew the conflict. Attila, by staying 
quietly in his camp instead of rushing against his 
enemies as usual, confessed himself beaten, and when 
he sullenly retired toward the south the Roman gen- 
eral judged it prudent not to follow him. 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. 28 

After the fall of the Roman Empire, 476, A. D., 
the Franks continued to grow in power and impor- 
tance, and ended by establishing themselves firmly 
in Gaul, which from them began about this time to be 
called Francia. Their name used to be thought to 
mean Freemen, but recent writers say that it has more 
nearly the sio:nifi cation of our word ferocious, and 
comes from an old name for a battle-axe. 




CHAPTER III, 

CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS — A. D. 481-511. 

HE French monarchy is generally considered 
to begin with Clovis, though he had several 
^ half-imaginary ancestors who are sometimes 
included in the list of sovereigns. The old writers 
tell us about one Pharamond, whom they call the first 
king of the Franks; but he seems to be a person even 
more mythical than the British king Arthur, and so 
much nonsense is mixed up with the accounts of him 
that it will be the safest way to let him drop altogeth- 
er. But his son Clodion (if Clodion was his son) was 
really a brave warrior, who fought against the Roman 
consul Aetius, and was defeated by him. Meroveus, 
the son of Clodion, was the one from whom the first 
royal family of France, the Merovingian, took its 
name; and Childeric, son of Meroveus, was the father 
of Clovis. 

What title these chiefs bore in their own lano-uao-e. 



24 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

is of little consequence. They were the founders of a 
long line of monarchs, and Ciodion is said to have 
taken delight in the name of the " long-haired," which 
was borne by his descendants, flowing hair being only 
allowed amono; kinof-s and nobles. It must be remem- 
bered always that they were not kings of France, but 
of tlie Franks, which was quite a different thing. 
When Clovis becavne king, he did not own a foot of 
land in what is now called France. His father, Chil- 
deric, was kino- of that division called the Salian 
Franks, possessing only a small portion of land in Bel- 
gica, within the limits of modern Belgium, and had 
found it hard work to hold his own without trying to 
get an^'thing away from his neighbors. By the time 
that Clovis reached manhood, however, the scene 
changes. He was. only fifteen years old when he came 
to the throne, and at twenty he fought a battle at Sois- 
sons with the Roman governor Syagrius, defeated him, 
and thus swept away the last faint trace of Roman do- 
minion in Gaul. That part of the country not occu- 
pied by the Franks was divided between the Burgun- 
diansand Visigoths, who had also taken advantage of 
the decay of the Roman power to establish themselves 
on this fertile soil. 

A story told about Clovis shows the rough manners 
of the times and his own politic, yet revengeful dispo- 
sition. Among the spoil distributed after the battle of 
Soissons was a rich vase, which had been taken some 
time before from a church in Rheims. The bishop of 
that city asked Clovis to restore it, which the latter 
promised to do, and requested that in the general 
division this vase mio-ht be allotted to him in addition 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. 25 

to his rifrhtful share, so that he miorht return it to the 
church. The soldiers agreed to this by general con- 
sent, for it was to CI o vis that they owed the victory, 
and this was a small favor to ask where there was an 
abundance of booty for all. But a vain and foolish 
Frank, jealous of the praises bestowed on Clovis, struck 
the vase a violent blow with his battle-axe, saying, 
"You shall have nothing but what comes to you fairly 
by lot." Clovis made no reply, but delivered the vase 
to the messenger just as it was, accepting apparently 
the condition that it should be included in his portion. 
A year afterwards, as he was reviewing his troops, 
he passed before each one in turn till he came to the 
offending soldier. Snatching away the man's battle- 
axe and throwing it on the ground, he reproved him 
sharply for not keeping it in better order. As the 
other stooped to pick it up, the king swung his own 
battle-axe with both hands in the air, bringing it down 
with a terrible crash on the skull of the unfortunate 
man, and thundered out the words, " So you did to the 
vase at Soissons! " 

A bold act of vengeance like this did more to im- 
press the minds of the half-savage warriors who were 
looking on than a year of steady discipline would 
have done, and Clovis found after this that his soldiers 
were cured of all desire to mutiny. 

The Franks themselves called this chieftain Chlod- 
wig, which is the same name with the German Ludwig, 
the French Louis and the English Lewis. The Latin 
form being short and easy to pronounce has been re- 
tained by most modern historians, but it must not be for- 
gotten that for several hundred years these conquerors 



26 HISTORY OF FRANCE. ^ 

of Gaul continued to be Germans in feelino- and lau- 
guage. It would be a mistake to think of them as 
French. 

After the battle of Soissons, Clovis began to think 
it was time for him to take a wife, and his marriage was 
a matter of more importance than such matters usually 
are to kings ; for on it was to depend, for a time at 
least, the religion of the new France. He and most 
of his countrymen were still Pagans, while the Gauls 
had all by this time become Christians, as had also the 
Visigoths in the south of France, and the Burgundians 
iu the east. 

It would appear that none of the Frankish maidens 
were especially pleasing to Clovis; for, hearing of the 
great beauty and other charms of Clotilda, niece of the 
King of Burgundy, he sent to ask her hand in mar- 
riage. Her uncle would have preferred not to bestow 
her upon a pagan, but he did not dare to refuse the 
victor of Soissons; so he gave the lovely Clotilda into 
the hands of the messengers- sent to demand her, and 
after a journey which must have been a very exciting 
one to her, she was conducted into the presence of the 
king. If she had not turned out to be as handsome as 
report had made her, Clovis would probably not have 
hesitated to send her back again; but he was more 
than satisfied — he was delighted, and the marriage 
took place forthwith. 

Clovis continued firm in his old belief, and when a 
little son was born and Clotilda wished to have it bap- 
tized, the rough king refused, saying that her God 
was no better than the rest, and that in fact, there was 
no proof that he was a god at all; Clotilda had her 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. 27 

way, however, and the little prince was christened 
with great solemnity, the Queen hoping in this way to 
influence her pagan husband, who no doubt loved im- 
posing ceremonies. But to the great disappointment 
of both, the child soon died, and then Clovis reproached 
his wife, saying that if it had been baptized in the 
name of one of his gods it would have lived, but that 
a baptism in the name of hers was as good as none at 
all. What answer she made to this bitter taunt we 
are not informed; but the fact that when a second 
son was born he was baptized just as the other had 
been, seems to show that the quarrel was not very 
serious. 

Before long this child also was taken sick and the 
king was indignant enough. " How could it be other- 
wise?" he said to the anxious mother; " baptized in the 
name of your Christ, you could not expect anything 
else." However, the baby was cured, and Clovis began 
to have a little more respect for the God of Clotilda: 
and he was soon destined to change his mind so entire- 
ly that his wife must have felt quite repaid for all the 
efforts she had made to bring him round to her way of 
thinking. 

When Clovis had been reigning fifteen years, several 
tribes of the Allemanni, a powerful German nation 
whose name still survives in AUemagne, the French 
word for Germany, crossed the Rhine and invaded the 
country of a division of Franks called Ripuarians, 
whose capital was Cologne. 

As the Salian Franks were on good terms with their 
eastern neighbors, Clovis marched at once to the relief 
of the latter, and a great battle was fought at Tolbiac, 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



near Cologne. The armies were well, matched, the 
fight was bloody, and for some time it seemed uncer- 
tain which side would conquer ; but in the midst of 
the strap-ofle Clovis raised his hands to Heaven and 
vowed that if Clotilda's God would give him the vic- 
tory, he would become a Christian. Then he rushed in 
among the enemy more furiously than ever, his sol- 
' diers were animated by his example, the German king 
was killed and the enemy driven from the field. 

Another account of this conversion is that Clovis 
had promised his wife before setting out that he would 
turn Christian if he was successful; but whichever 
one we take, we can see that he was still much of a 
Pagan at "heart and thought Clotilda's only one of many 
gods who might give him the victory if they chose. 
We will hope that before being baptized by the good 
bishop St. Remy, he was better instructed, though, 
unhappily, his conduct during the rest of his life did 
not show that he had a very intelligent idea of what 
such a change meant. "Bow thine head" said the 
bishop to him at his baptism; " adore what thou hast 
burned; burn what thou hast adored!" Then he was 
anointed with holy oil which we are told was brought 
from heaven by a dove for that special purpose, and 
more than three thousand of his bravest soldiers were 
baptized at the same time. This was on Christmas 
day, 496 A. D. 

The conversion of Clovis was of far greater impor- 
tance to the prosperity of the people of Gaul than 
would appear at first sight. They had up to this time 
consisted of various groups, without any interests in 
common and in some cases bitterly opposed to each 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. 29 

other; they were now about to begin on a period 
when, being brought under one rule, they were 
to " pull together " as it were, for the common glor}?- 
of all. The Christian Church had by this time become 
one of the well-recognized governing powers of civil- 
ized Europe. In all the oppressions and want suffered 
by the lower orders, it was to the bishops that they 
looked for help and defence, and for the redress of 
their many grievances; and by allying himself with the 
clergy, Clovis secured their support and consequently 
the chief influence in the country. 

Having secured these important friends, Clovis now 
began to think of enlarging his dominions. He first 
reduced to submission the people of Armorica (that 
peninsula in the west of France which was afterward 
called Brittany), and then turned his attention to Bur- 
gundy, whose king was a hateful old tyrant who had 
murdered two of his own brothers, the father of Queen 
Clotilda being one of them. This bad man was glad 
to buy peace by offering Clovis an annual tribute in 
money, so Burgundy, as well as Armorica, was added 
by Clovis to the countries which owned his sway. Biit 
he had no idea of stopping here. He turned his newly- 
adopted piety to good account by saying to his sol- 
diers, " What a shame it. is that the fairest part of Gaul 
should be in possession of those Arian heretics!" 
meaninor the VisijTOths in the south, who did not believe 
in the same form of Christianity that he did. You may 
be sure that the soldiers asked nothing better than to 
do some more fighting, with Clovis at their head; so 
the army set out on its march. 

An incident is related which shows how strongly 



30 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

this king felt the importance of keeping on good terms 
with the church. As he was crossing the territory of 
Tours, he forbade the soldiers to take anything except 
grass and water, out of respect to Saint Martin, the 
patron saint of that district. One of them thought 
-he would be safe in stealing some hay, which he 
said was only dried grass, from a poor man who strug- 
gled hard to keep his property. When Clovis heard of 
this he cut off the soldier's head with one blow of 
his sword, saying; "What will become of us if we 
offend St. Martin?" Whether he ordered the hay to 
be restored to the poor man, or paid for, is not stated. 
That was probably not thought any part of the atone- 
ment. You know that in those days an army was 
expected to take whatever it wanted from the country- 
people along its line of march, and it was only the 
policy or piety of the king that in this particular 
case made a difference. 

Clovis met the Visigoths not far from Poitiers, and 
a dreadful battle was fought, in which he killed their 
king Alario with his own hand, and put their army to 
flight. But Theodoric, the ruler of the Ostrogoths or 
East Goths (the Visigoths being West Goths), was 
now king of Italy and came to the rescue of his 
neighbors. The result was that a small portion of 
their territory called Septimania, around the old Roman 
city of Narbonne, kept its independence until it was 
conquered some time later by the Moors of Spain. 

So great a King must have a capital, and Clovis fixed 
upon a village on an island in the river Seine as worthy 
of the honor of becoming his royal residence. This 
place was originally called Lutetia, which means mud- 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. '61 



town, but the Romans had changed its name to Paris, 
from a tribe called Parisii, which they found there 
when they first conquered the country. Clovis did 
much to improve this city of Paris, and possibly if it 
had been let alone from his time we might still see 
some remains of his work; but the enemies who have 
so often burned it since then have left little trace of 
its old glory, save the crumbling remains of the Em- 
peror Julian's palace on the bank of the river Seine. 

Thus far, perhaps, we may have thought of Clovis 
only as an able and unscrupulous warrior, who showed 
his ingenuity in devising reasons for adding other 
people's dominions to his own; but the latter part of 
his reign proved that ambition had overcome all the 
nobler feelings of his nature, and he appears before us 
only in the light of a cold-blooded murderer. The 
Franks consisted of a collection of tribes, each under 
its own chief, who were joined together for purposes 
of common defence. Clovis determined that he would 
be sole king of all these tribes, and took measures 
accordingly. 

Sending secretly a messenger to Cloderic, the son 
of one of their kings, he said, " Your father is old, and 
his wound makes him limp on one foot; if he should 
die his kingdom would come to you, and we should be 
friends." The base son had his father assassinated 
while asleep in his tent, and then sent word to his 
tempter, " My father is dead, and his gold and silver 
are mine. Send and take what you please." Of course 
Clovis sent again, but this time his envoys had other 
instructions. Cloderic showed them the great chest 
where his father had kept his treasures. " Plunge in 



32 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

your hand to the bottom," said the messenger of Clovis, 
"so as not to leave any behind." The unsuspecting 
king did so, and while thus helpless, a battle-axe split 
his skull in two. 

As soon as this success was reported to Clovis, he 
went to Cologne, the capital of Cloderic, and said to 
the Franks whom he caused to be assembled there, 
"Listen to what has happened: the father of Cloderic 
is dead, killed by his son's order, and some one, I don't 
know who, killed his son while he was looking over 
his father's treasures. I had nothing to do with it, for 
I could not do anything so wicked as to shed the blood 
of my relatives, but I can give you some good advice 
if you like to take it. Put yourselves under my protec- 
tion, and I will take care of you." Then they shouted 
for joy, lifted him on a huge buckler or shield, and 
hailed him as their King. 

This was only the beginning. Taking advantage of 
an affront offered him twenty years before by another 
of these kings, he took him and his son prisoners, and 
had their heads shaved, saying that they should become 
monks. The son used some expression which Clovis 
chose to consider as a threat, and had them both be- 
headed, though they were utterly helpless and in his 
power. A third king being defeated in battle and 
taken prisoner, had his arms tied behind his back, and 
in this condition was carried before Clovis, together 
with his son. 

"Why did you dishonor our family," inquired the 
cruel victor, "by letting yourself be bound? You 
might much better have died." And. so saying, he 
split open his head with a battle-axe. Then turning 



CLOVIS, KING OF THE FRANKS. 33 

to the son, he said, "If you had helped your father as 
you ought to have done, he would never have been 
overcome;" and crushed his skull in the same manner. 
One more king remained, who was killed by the order 
of Clovis, though not with his own hands, and thus he 
found himself undisputed lord of all the Franks and 
of the Roman Gauls, and receiving tribute from the 
nominal sovereigns of Burgundy and Brittany. 

He was truly a wonderful man, and had he been as 
good as he was great, would have commanded our 
liearty admiration. As it is, we must add his name to 
the long list of those in whom a love of power has 
dried up not only every feeling of virtue and honor, 
but also of natural affection, for many of his victims 
were his own near relatives. It is said that after all 
these murders Clovis pathetically exclaimed : " Alas ! 
I am left alone among strangers, with r.one of my kin- 
dred to support me in the day of trouble !" The sus- 
picion is expressed by a shrewd chronicler of the time, 
that he hoped in this way to find out whether he had 
any relatives left, so that he might kill the rest of them. 

We might expect that a reign of crime and blood- 
shed like this would have been closed by a violent 
death, either on the battle-field or by assassination; 
but Clovis died peaceably in his bed, after a reign of 
thirty years, being only forty-five years old, and having 
enjoyed his new dignity of King of all the Franks but 
little more than a year. He was buried at Paris, in 
the church of St. Peter and St. Paul, the name of 
which was afterwards changed to St. Genevieve, in 
honor of a peasant girl who was said to have saved the 
city from an attack of the Huns. 
3 



34 HISTORY OF FEANCE. 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE LATER MEROVIl^GIANS. 511-752. 




HE earliest historians tell us that Meroveus or 
Meerwig, the son of Clodion, was the grand- 
fl father of Clovis, and there seems to be no 
reason why we should not believe them. His descend- 
ants are generally called Merovingians, according to the 
Latin form of the word, though they are sometimes 
spoken of under their German name of Meerwings. 

This race or family seem to have been about as 
wicked as any that ever disgraced the noble name of 
King. Clovis was bad enough, but when you read of 
what some of his descendants did, you begin to have 
a feeling of respect for him by comparison. When he 
died, his kingdom was divided among his four sons, a 
very bad arrangement, causing continual strife and 
discord, but which was the only one known in those 
times. Each one had a different portion assigned him, 
and was called by the name of his capital — King 
of Metz, Orleans, Paris or Soissons. But they soon 
began to fall by violence, and leave their places to 
others. 

When the first one died, queen Clotilda took his 
three orphan sons under her care, hoping to see them 
one day restored to their father's dominions. But two 
of her remaining sons, having obtained possession of 
the young princes, sent a messenger to her with a 
sword and a pair of scissors, asking which sh.e would 
choose for them, it being understood that shaving their 



THE LATER MEROVINGIANS. 35 

heads was the same as disgracing thetn and making it 
forever impossible for them to reign. She answered 
passionately that she would rather see them dead than 
deo-raded; and before she had time to chano;e her mind 
or do anything for their rescue, one of their uncles killed 
the eldest two by thrusting his dagger Into their sides as 
they clung to his knees for mercy. The youngest was 
forcibly carried away by some kind-hearted person and 
kept in a place of security; but when he grew up, being 
weary of the awful scenes of blood and cruelty which 
were all that he knew of life, he went into a monastery, 
cut off his long hair with his own hands, and thus saved 
his uncles the trouble of killing him. 

Clotaire, the youngest son of Clovis, was finally left 
in possession of all his father's dominions, and at his 
death the kino-dom was ao-aln divided amono; his four 
sons, with the same results — a ferocious struggle for 
the supreme power. The country of Australia, be- 
longing to the East Franks, and of Neustria, belong- 
ing to the West Franks, now began to have a separate 
history. Between these two a great rivalry arose, and 
they were often at war with one another. It is in con- 
nection with this that a story is told so horrible that 
one could almost wish that it had never been wrltter; 
down ; but as it is related in all histories of France, 
we ought to know something about it. 

The king of the Visigoths had two charming and 
accomplished daughters, one called Brunehaut or 
Brynhild, married to Sigebert, King of Austrasia, and 
the other Galswintha, married to his brother Chllperic, 
King of Neustria. Chllperic cared more for a worth- 
loss woman called Fredegonde than he did for his wife; 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



and in a few weeks the beautiful Galswintha was found 
strangled in her bed, to please Fredegonde, as every- 
body supposed. The King gave proof of the justice 
of this suspicion by immediately marrying his wicked 
favorite, and Brunehaut determined to be revenged on 
the murderer of her sister. 

A long war followed, in the course of which Chil- 
peric was dethroned by his own people and Sigebert 
elected king in his stead. In the midst of the rejoic- 
ings which took place on this occasion, the vile Fred- 
egonde saw her advantage, and arming two of her 
pages with poisoned daggers, she sent them into his 
presence on some friendly pretext, and they stabbed 
him to the heart. She then caused her step-son to be 
executed on a false accusation, and his young wife to be 
burned alive; and having by these murders secured 
the succession to her own son, she ended her days, 
to all appearance, in perfect prosperity and happi- 
ness. 

Brunehaut was not so fortunate. After the death 
of her son she carried on the government in the name 
of her grandsons, and seems on the whole to have 
managed it wisely and well, though her ambition had 
led her to commit fearful crimes. She patronized men 
of letters and art, who were very rare in those days, 
and her name was long; connected with monuments of 
energy and wisdom such as roads, bridges and public 
buildings. After many changes of fortune she fell 
into the hands of Fredegonde's son, Clotaire, who, after 
having her led through his camp on a camel exposed 
to the insults of his brutal soldiers, tied her by one 
hand, one foot and her long hair to the tail of a wild 



THE LATER MEROVINGIANS. 37 

horse, where she was soon dragged and trampled to 
pieces. 

Such was the fate of this queen of Austrasia, — a 
woman eighty years old, the daughter, wife and mother 
of kings, who had been ruling a kingdom for nearly 
forty years ! 

Clotaire, the son of Fredegonde, was now proclaimed 
king of Austrasia as well as Neustria, and thus his 
mother's desire was accomplished, though she did not 
live to see it. His son Dagobert was the only king of 
his race after Clovis who deserves to be remembered. 
He seems to have been not quite so wicked as the rest, 
and far superior to them in mental ability. His pri- 
vate life was so bad that he is said to have had three '« 
wives at once; he caused the murder of his young 
nephew, and ordered nine thousand unfortunate beings 
who had fled to him for refuge from cruelty at home, 
and to whom he had offered an asylum, to be massa- 
cred because he did not know how to feed them or 
where to put them. Yet still we must give him his 
due. He did something; toward establishino- law and 
order in a time when such thino;s had been almost for- 
gotten, and was so much better than most who had 
gone before, and abler than any who came after him, 
that by comparison with the rest we must rank him, 
next to Clovis, as the greatest man of his own race. 

After him comes a miserable succession of nobodies 
— phantom kings, as some writers call them — without 
power or influence, and possessing nothing of royalty 
but its name. They are called in history the Fain4- 
ants or do-nothings; but as every country must have 
some sort of government, the place of authority was 



HISTORY OF FRANCE, 



taken by a very remarkable set of men called Mayors 
of the Palace, a title at first meaning nothing more 
than the Latin Major-domus^ or steward. They tried 
their utmost to keep the young princes from ever grow- 
ing to be men in anything but appearance, and encour- 
aged them in habits of vice and indolence, which 
destroyed their health so that few of them reached the 
age of manhood. One of these Mayors, Pepin d'Her- 
istal, held the real power during the reigns of four 
shadow -kings, who were more fortunate than the " Six 
Boy-kings" of England in having a wise and able 
man to take the reins of government from their feeble 
hands. 
^ His first business on coming' into office was to bring 
under one government the two countries called Aus- 
trasia and Neustria, both occupied by Franks, but 
differing much from each other. The Austrasian, or 
Eastern Franks, were almost wholly German in their 
customs, feelings, and language. The Neustrian 
Franks, on the contrary, were few in number com- 
pared with the old Roman Gauls, among whom they 
had settled, who clung to their ancient government 
and language. Pepin was an Austrasian, and, after 
much fighting, at last gained the battle of Testry, 
which established his power over both countries, " The 
Franks under Pepin," says a great modern writer, 
" seem to have conquered Gaul a second time." From 
this time his authority was undisputed. He had. under 
the title of Duke of France and Mayor of the Palace, 
the full control of both king and country, made war or 
peace at his will, and carried on the government quite 
independently of the long-haired idler who was amus- 



THE LATER MEROVINGIANS. 39 

ing himself with games or dogs at his country-house. 

He kept up appearances, however. Once a year he 
would have the so-called king taken from his nest, 
splendidly dressed, and placed in a magnificent car 
drawn by oxen; and thus, with his long hair and beard 
floating in the wind, the descendant of Clovis w^ould be 
paraded through the streets of Paris and conducted to 
a hall where an assembly of his own nobles and of 
foreiorn ambassadors was waitinor to receive him. He 
was then seated on a golden throne and made to 
repeat a few sentences which he had learned by heart 
or which were whispered to him by the attendants; 
then he was carried back in the same stately manner 
in which he had come, to his country villa, there to 
spend another year in vice and idleness. 

But the time was soon coming when he was to be 
relieved from even this exertion. When Pepin 
d'Heristal died, he left a son Charles, afterwards 
called Martel, who was quite able to carry out his fath- 
er's enterprises. He was just twenty-five years old, 
in the full vigor of health and strength, and ready for 
any adventure which might offer itself. He first 
marched against the Neustrians, who had elected a 
rival Mayor of the Palace, and set up a rival king; and 
having defeated them at Soissons, the old battle-field 
of Clovis, he was able to turn his attention to a more 
dangerous enemy. 

About a hundred years before this time, the Arabian 
Mahomet had set up a new religion which had been 
eagerly adopted by large numbers of people in Asia 
and the northern part of Africa; and a little before 
the death of Pepin, these Mahometans or Saracens, as 



40 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

they were then called, had conquered Spain and 
established a powerful kingdom there. It would have 
been a terrible thinp; if these enemies of true relio-ion 
had gained a foothold in France, for they were famous 
fighters, and were pretty sure to drive out either 
Christianity or Christians from any country they took 
possession of. So you will readily believe that when it 
was known that a body of them had crossed the Pyr- 
enees, and settled in Septimania, all Gaul shook in its 
shoes. 

Charles was equal to the occasion. He collected an 
army and marched southward at once, meeting the 
Saracens on a field near the city of Tours. Here 
the two armies lay quiet for a week, looking at each 
other. Why they waited we don't know, for they 
were apparently all ready to fight ; but perhaps they 
were dimly conscious that the fate of Europe hung on 
the battle that was to come, and did not wish to risk 
a failure though too much haste. We can imagine 
the grim Franks, in their heavy armor, looking out 
from under an iron helmet with disdain upon the tur- 
baned heads of the Moslems, while the latter, whose 
eyes delighted in bright colors, thought the battle-array 
of the Franks very barbarous beside their own gor- 
geous dress. The Saracens were the first to make the 
attack. They rushed furiously against the Christians 
with a rao^e which seemed as if it must bear down all 
before it, but their keen swords could not pierce the 
iron armor; while the heavy battle-ax of the Frank 
crashed fearfully down upon the soft turbans of his 
slighter foe, and gradually the invader gave way; 
Abdel Rhaman, the Saracen commander, was killed, 



THE LATER MEROVINGIANS. 41 

and when darkness had fallen on the long, long day, 
both armies withdrew from the field. Charles had 
well earned the surname of Martel, or The Hammer, 
bestowed upon him by common consent in that age 
and retained by all succeeding ones in grateful remem- 
brance of his victory. He had indeed hammered 
the Saracens; the Crescent bowed down before the 
Cross, and Europe was saved. If there had been a 
poet in Charles's ranks he might have sung as Sir 
Walter Scott did about the battle of Fiodden — 

*' Then did their loss his foemen know; 
Their king, their lords, their mig-htiesfc low, 
They melted from the field as snow, 
When streams are swollen and south winds blow, 
Dissolves in silent dew." 

In the morning the Franks started out bravely to 
begin again, but no answering host advanced to give 
them battle. The white tents of the Moslems were 
spread out before them — empty. In the silence of 
night the enemy had stolen away and were retreating 
at full speed towards Narbonne. This strongly forti- 
fied town resisted all the efforts of Charles to take it, 
and remained in the hands of the Saracens until it 
was taken from them long afterwards by his son. 

That son, called Pepin the Short, was the first of his 
family to assume in i;»ame what they had long possess- 
ed in fact, the style and title of king. At Charles 
Martel's death the throne had been vacant for some 
years, but he had not thought it worth while to 
look up another puppet to place upon it. Pepin, how- 
ever (or Pippin, as the Germans called him), was more 
prudent. He did not think the time had come when 



42 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

it would be safe to make such an important change as 
to call himself king, so he hunted up another forlorn 
Merovino^ian from the convent where he had been shut 
up, let his hair grow, and called him King Ohilderic 
III. 

Pepin was acute enough to know that unless he 
could get the church on his side he would have a great 
deal of trouble in keeping his kingdom, so he sent am- 
bassadors to Rome to ask the Pope which ought to be 
kino- — the one who had the name, or the one who has 
the power and exercised the duties of a king. Pope 
Zacharias had already had a private conference with 
Pepin's friend, St. Boniface, and had made up his mind 
what to say. So he answered,' "The one who has the 
power ;" and Pepin lost no time in making use of the 
permission. St. Boniface, who was a really devout 
and good man, and a missionary among the Germans, 
anointed him with holy oil from the vial used at the 
coronation of Olovis ; Childeric was shaven again and 
sent back to his cloister, and the first of the Carloving- 
ian Kings was seated firmly on the throne of France. 

The name of this family comes from Carolus, the 
Latin for Charles, and might therefore more properly 
be spelt Carolingian, but we take it as we find it. 
The Germans called them Karlings, or sons of Karl, 
and this form is occasionally used by English writers 
also. 



PEPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE. 43 

CHAPTER V. 

PEPI2T AND CHARLEMAGNE. 752-814. 




S was to be expected, the son of the great 
Charles, and the father of Charles the Great 
(for such was Pepin), did not let the grass 
grow under his heels as long as there was anything to 
be done. He attacked the Saracens in the south and 
the Bretons in the west, driving out the one, and 
reducinor the other to obedience, and more than once 
went into Italy to help the Pope against the Lombards 
or Long-beards, who threatened to destroy the city of 
Rome. Having conquered them he made the pontiff 
a present of their country, which was nearly the same 
as the modern Lombardy. This is called "Pepin's 
Donation," and was the foundation of the long friend- 
ship which existed between the popes and the kings 
of France. 

A story is told of Pepin which shows the general 
opinion of his strength and courage. Soon after he 
was made king, he was looking on with his nobles at 
a fight between a lion and a bull, for in those days 
such animals were kept on purpose to have them fight 
together for the amusement of human — not humane 
— beings. The bull was getting the worst of it, when 
the king called out: "Who dares to separate them?" 
No one offering to do this, he jumped into the arena 
and cut off the heads of both with his sword. "Now," 
said he, "am I not worthy to be called your king?" 
Nearly his whole reign was filled up with warlike 



44 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

. '^^■, — — — 

enterprises, and when he died he left his kingdom to 
his two sons, Charles and Oarloman, but fortunately 
for the nation this divided rule did not last long. 
Carloman died within a few years, leaving the 
undisputed throne to his brother Charles, whom we 
shall henceforth speak of under his best known name 
of Charlemagne, which means Charles the Grreat. It 
shows how much more civilized the world was getting 
in those days, that nobody thought it necessary to 
plunge a knife into the heart of Carloman's two sons, 
or to shave their heads and make monks of them. 
They went off quietly with their mother to Lombardy, 
where they were kindly welcomed by its king, and 
allowed to live at his court. ■ 

It was indeed a great man who now sat upon the 
throne of France. Whether we think of him as the 
conqueror of mighty nations, as the wise ruler of his 
own, or as the friend and patron of learning at a time 
when almost all knowledge of books was confined to 
the monks, we must still admire his wonderful energy, 
his splendid military genius, and the far-sighted wis- 
dom which enabled him to see that the real greatness 
of a country consisted not in its conquests, but in the 
instruction and elevation of its people. 

As it would take too longto'speak of all the warlike 
expeditions of Charlemagne, of which there were said 
to be fifty-three, I can only tell you in general that he 
attacked his neighbors on every side, an(^ was in the 
Jong run successful everywhere, except against the 
Moors, then inhabitants of Spain. He advanced 
with a grand flourish into their country, and suc- 
ceeded in bringing the northern part to submis- 



PEPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE: ^ 45 

sion, but finally judged it best to return to his 
own land. To do this he had to cross the moun- 
tainous district in which the Pyrenees are situ- 
ated, and which was occupied by people called 
Basques, who were friendly to the Saracens and hated 
the Franks. The main body of his army advanced 
safely through the mountain passes, but as the rear- 
guard were traversing that of Roncesvalles, they 
suddenly found a great storm of rocks, stones, trunks 
of trees and other heavy things coming down on their 
heads; many of them were crushed to death, or fell 
down the precipice and were dashed in pieces on the 
rocks below, while the Basques, taking advantage of 
their confusion, rushed upon them a:nd killed every 
one that was left. 

Many romantic stories are told about this battle, as 
it is called, although the Franks had little chance to 
strike back ; and a knight named Roland is especially 
mentioned as being the bravest of the brave. In these 
legends a friend of his, called Oliver, is represented 
as being associated with him in all sorts of impossible 
adventures, and both performed such w^onders of valor 
that nobody could decide which deserved the most 
praise ; but though these are very pleasant to read 
about, we cannot think of them as facts. 

In all other directions Charlemagne was successful. 
He conquered many nations in Germany, and, among 
others, the Saxons, with whom he had a war that lasted 
more than thirty years; but though often driven back, 
he never gave up his purpose, and they finally submit- 
ted. Their most famous chief was Witikind, who was 
converted to Christi.anity during this war, and from 



46 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

t^. - 

being one of the fiercest and most bloody-minded of 
heathens, became such a good man that some people 
called him a saint. Charlemagne professed to carry 
on this war principally for the sake of converting the 
Saxons, and no doubt his soldiers did good service in 
protecting the faithful missionaries who were engaged 
in this work; but when we read that he had four thou- 
sand helpless prisoners massacred at once, in revenge 
for a victory they had -obtained over the Franks, it 
does not seem as if his Christianity had done much for 
his own character. 

For thirty-two years after the beginning of his reign, 
Charlemagne called himself only king of the Franks and 
Lombards, but in the year 800 he received a still 
grander title. He went in great state to visit Pope 
Leo IIL at Rome, and as he was kneeling on Christ- 
mas Day before the high altar in the Church of St. 
Peter, the Pope placed an imperial crown upon his 
head, and all the vast multitude of people present 
shouted, " Lon^ life and victory to Charles Augustus, 
crowned by God, the great and pacific emperor of the 
Romans." Charlemagne professed that this was an 
utter surprise to him — that he was unvforthy of it, and 
so forth ; and one writer goes so far as to say that if 
he had known what the Pope was going to do he would 
not have gone to the church that day; but this is a little 
too absurd to be believed. No doubt he knew all 
about it, and liked it too; and he immediately set up a 
court as much like the one at Constantinople as he 
could, and even had some thoughts of marrying the 
old Empress Irene, and so of adding the Empire of the 
East to that of the West; but just at this time Irene, 



PEPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE. 47 

who had murdered her own son in order to become 
Empress, was in her turn deposed, and Charlemagne's 
ambition in that direction bore no fruits. 

But everywhere else he was supreme. One by one 
the nations of Germany had submitted to him, and 
France was as firmly bound together as it is to-day. 
Outside of his own dominions, all foreign princes were 
proud to have his friendship, and vied w4th each other 
in the splendor of their embassies and the magnifi- 
cence of their gifts. The caliph Haroun Al Raschid, 
the hero of the Arabian Nights, sent him some wonder- 
ful presents; among others, a clock that struck the 
hours, an ape and an elephant — all new to the eyes of 
Western Europe. 

The youno- Eo-bert of Eno-land came to the court of 
the great monarch to be instructed in the arts of refine- 
ment to which as yet his own country was a stranger; 
and who knows but that he may have picked up, 
either from example or in conversation, some ideas 
which were of use to him in brinj^ino; into one the 
seven kingdoms of his little island? 

We should do great injustice to Charlemagne if we 
allowed the recollection of his military glory to put 
out of sight the two facts which do him even more 
honor — his success as a legislator, and his devotion 
to learning, so rare in those ignorant times. We 
should all of us have enjoyed looking on while what 
was called " The School of the Palace," was holding 
one of its morning- sessions. We should see the erreat 
emperor seated on a highly ornamented chair which 
served as his throne, with his sons and daughters near 
him, and the nobles, such as were allowed the privi- 



48 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

lege, a little lower down in the room; there standing 
among them we should see the good monk Alcuin, 
whom Charlemagne had caused to come from Eno-land 
expressly for this purpose, lecturing, as we should call it 
now, on the various subjects which were then consid- 
ered interesting; such as grammar, rhetoric, astronomy 
and theology. 

Besides these lectures there must have been times 
when the young people were taught reading and writ- 
ing, both of which accomplishments were extremely 
rare in those days. It is said that the Emperor tried 
hard to learn to write, but never made very good work 
of it, though he carried tablets in his bosom on which to 
practice at odd times. His fingers were too much 
used to holding the sword to be very skillful with the 
pen. Reading, too, was much more difficult before 
the art of printing was invented, and as all books 
were copied by hand with a pen, they were scarce and 
expensive. 

Charlemagne built himself a beautiful palace at Aix 
la Chapelle, in Germany, which was named after Aix 
in Provence, because of the mineral springs found 
there. He took great delight in these, and would 
have sometimes as many as a hundred persons bathing 
with him at one time. The name La Chapelle was 
added to distins-uish this city from the southern Aix, 
and came from a fine cathedral which he built there. 
The palace was adorned with all sorts of splendid 
things, taken from cities which Charlemagne had con- 
quered, just as Napoleon afterwards enriched Paris 
with the spoils of Rome; but all are gone now. You 
can still see the cathedral, however, and in it is pre- 



PEPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE. 49 



served the chair which the Emperor sat in, both living 
and dead, for when he died, 

" No useless coffin enclosed his breast." 

His corpse was dressed in imperial robes, with a 
crown on his head, a golden sword by his side, and a 
golden copy of the gospels in his hand; and thus, slt- 
tmg on his throne, he was placed in the tomb. Nearly 
two hundred years afterward, the Emperor Otho III. 
took it into his head to remove the royal remains, 
which were found in a good state of preservation. It 
seems a pity that he could not have let the dead man 
rest quietly in his tomb, after having been so con- 
stantly busy in his life time. 

Charlemagne died in the year 814, exactly one hun- 
dred years after the death of his great grandfather, 
Pepin d'Heristal, having reigned fourteen years as 
emperor, and not far from fifty in all. He was seventy 
years old. 

In his love of learning, he reminds us of Alfred 
the Great, of England, but having been so much a 
man of war in the early part of his life he never be- 
came as well informed as Alfred, who was always a 
student. During the time when he was comparatively 
peaceful — that is, after he became emperor — he tried 
to get all the knowledge he could by having people 
read aloud to him at his meals, so as never to lose a 
moment of time; but at that age it was slow work. In 
his intense energy and activity, and power of applica- 
tion to business, he may be compared to the first Na- 
poleon. His moral character fell far below our stand- 
ard of right at the present day, and his cruelty to the 
Saxons, under the pretext of religious zeal, is a dark 
4 



50 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

stain on his name; but such crimes were looked upon 
by even the good men of his own day with great in- 
dulgence, and we must not judge him from our own 
standpoint. 

In person Charlemagne was tall and stout, with a 
round head, a long nose, large, keen eyes, and a thick 
nock. This, which is told us by Eginhard, who was 
educated in the palace and has left a valuable account 
of what went on in his time, is all we know about it; 
but we imagine a noble and commanding countenance, 
and, according to the custom of the time, a full, flow- 
ing beard. It is certain that he impressed with awe 
all that came near him. He remained to the end of 
his life a German in feeling* and habits, and though 
France was the main seat of his empire, he seems to 
approach more nearly to the emperor of Germany than 
to the kinofs of his own country. 

Charlemagne must have had some fun about him, 
too. He despised foppery in dress, and once when he 
saw a party of young nobles overdressed he took them 
on a long ride with him through rain and mud, until 
their fine clothes were drenched and spoiled. Then 
he pretended not to notice it, and made them dine 
with him in the same condition. After that they prob- 
ably kept a sharp look-out, and saved their finery to 
appear in when he was away. 

The emperor himself took care to set an example of 
the simplicity he liked to see in the young people 
around him. He wore a linen imdergarment, wnwen 
by his own daughters, and a woolen tunic and breeches, 
over which, wh^n out of doors, he threw a long blue 
cloak. Thick shoes, leggings 'made of bright-colored 



THE LATER CABLOVINGIANS. 51 



bands crossed over one another, and a broad leather 
belt, to which his good sword Joyeuse always hung, 
completed his costume. The ladies of the court were 
allowed more liberty than the men. They wore silken 
tunics with long, flowing sleeves, and had their gar- 
ments trimmed with costly furs. 

The great mass of the people was then, as for many 
hundred years afterward, sunk in ignorance and ground 
down by poverty. Famine and wretchedness were so 
constantly their companions that it did not even occur 
to them to complain, and there was no one to come to 
their help. They toiled hopelessly from the cradle to 
the grave, happy if Fate had placed them under a mas- 
ter who left them a whole skin, and required nothing 
more from them than the unremitting service of a 
lifetime. 



CHAPTER VL 

THE LATER CARLOVINGIANS. 814-987. 




HARLEMAGNE had portioned out his em- 
pire among his three sons, giving to each what 
he. considered a just share; but to his great 
grief two of them died before him, leaving only Louis 
to succeed to the vast inheritance. This prince, whom 
French historians call " Le Debonnaire," or the Good 
Natured, and Latin ones " The Pious," had already had 
some experience in governing, or trying to govern ; for 
when he was only three years old, his father made him 



52 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

king of Aquitaine, a country in the south of France, 
and the baby-monarch, who was carried in his cradle 
to his new dominions, was on entering them dressed in 
a little suit of armor, and led throuofh the streets on 
horseback, so that the people might pay him homage. 
When he grew up he did not show anything of his 
father's ambitious disposition, being too truly pious to 
want to make himself great at any one else's expense; 
and the first years of his reign exhibit a love of simple 
justice which was not often seen in that rude and self- 
ish ao;e. 

After the death of his first wife, Louis was persuaded 
to marry a beautiful but unprincipled woman called 
Judith, and out of this marriage sprang all his other 
misfortunes. He had divided (he empire, as was usu- 
ally done, among his three sons by his first wife; and 
all recognized this division as just and proper. But 
Judith thought that her son, afterwards known as 
Charles the Bald, ought' also to have a share; and to 
please her, Louis made a kingdom for him out of some 
of the countries already given to his older brothers. 

The consequences of this unwise action were such 
as might have been expected in those stormy times. 
The defrauded sons rebelled (though they did not yet 
possess the kingdoms, and could not have them till 
after their father was dead); and from that !j;ime to the 
end of his life, the reign of Louis is one scene of dis- 
cord, humiliation and misery. At one time we find the 
sons getting the better of their father, and imposing 
on him everj?- mortification that they could inflict in 
the way of imprisonment and public disgrace; at an- 
other, there is a reaction against this unnatural war- 



THE LATER CARLOVINGIANS. 53 

fare, and Louis is restored to his throne by outside 
help. Once everything was prepared for a battle the 
next day; when, on rising in the morning, Louis found 
that all his principal nobles, with the soldiers under 
their command, had silently gone over to the enemy 
during the night. The place where this shameful 
treachery took place was from that time called " The 
Field of Lying." 

Louis died of a broken heart, and the next year 
his sons fought a bloody battle one against another 
at Fontenay, where it is said that eighty thousand 
men perished. Soon after this a treaty was made at 
Yerdun, by which the empire was parceled out among 
the brothers, Judith's son, Charles the Bald, being 
made king of France. By the death of his brothers 
he became also for a short time EmjDeror of Germany, 
but when he died, the vast empire which it had cost 
Charlemagne nearly his whole life to establish, was 
broken up into its natural divisions of France, Ger- 
many and Italy. 

While these events were taking place, other influ- 
ences were at work destined in the end to be of great 
importance to France. Far to the north, in those 
countries called by the general name of Scandinavia, 
lived a fierce race of pirates, who had begun even before 
the death of Charlemagne to make their appearance 
on his coasts. He haddefendedhimself against them; 
but under the reigns of his weak son and quarrelsome 
grandsons, these dreaded sea-kings, as they called 
themselves, sailed boldly up the Seine, carried their 
boats across from one river to another, and laid waste 
the country wherever they went. Li the time of Charles 



54 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the Bald they attacked Paris and plundered its rich 
churches and abbeys. The king, instead of fighting 
them, gave them money to go away, which of course 
only encouraged them to come again the next year; 
and France grew to dread their approach like that. of 
a pestilence. 

You may form some idea of the recreations of their 
playful moments, from the fact that one more humane 
than the rest forbade his companions to pitch children 
at each other and catch them on the points of their 
pikes, as had been their custom. From this he was 
called by the endearing name of "The Saviour of 
Children." 

Charles the Bald left one son, Louis IL, called Le 
Begue, or The Stammerer. After him came in quick 
succession his three sons, Louis III., Carloman, and 
Charles the Simple. The latter, weak and incapable, 
was entirely under the control of one of his great 
nobles, Robert, Count of Paris. By his advice, Charles 
offered to negotiate with the leader of the Northmen, 
who was called Rolf or Rollo, and v/ho, though a pagan, 
had the Christian virtue of keeping his word. A 
treaty was made between them by which it was 
agreed that Rollo should marry Charles's daughter, 
Gisela, and receive a part of Neustria as a permanent 
possession. In return he consented to become a 
Christian and to refrain from committing any depreda- 
tions on the soil of France outside of the territory 
granted to him, which was named Normandy, from 
the Northmen who settled there. This Rollo was 
great-great-grandfather of William the Norman, con- 
queror of England. 



THE LATER CARLO FINGIANS. 55 

Rollo did as he had promised. He not only let alone 
what did not belong to him, but proved a just and 
wise ruler in his own country. When he was about 
to take the oath of alleo-iance to Charles which was in- 
eluded in the conditions of the treaty, he was in- 
formed that it was absolutely necessary that he should 
comply with the usual form by kissing the foot of his 
sovereign. As no persuasion could induce him to do 
this, he was finally allowed to perform the ceremony 
by proxy, that is, to send some one in his place. But 
the rude soldier who was deputed for this purpose was 
equally unwilling to go through this form of submis-^^ 
sion, and instead of kneeling down to touch the king's- 
foot with his lips, he seized it in his hand and lifted 
it to his mouth, overturning jDoor Charles, throne and 
all, amid the loud laughter of the coarse Normans 
and the suppressed anger of the Frenchmen. The 
king dared not resent the insult, but passed it off 
as a joke, glad to get into his chair again with 
whole bones. 

After the death of Charles the Simple, who is sup- 
posed to have been murdered in the castle of Peronne 
by one of his own nobles, another lord called Hugh 
the Great, (son of the count of Paris), might have 
made himself king without opposition from any one, 
if he had so chosen; but he was too prudent or too 
patriotic to do this, and sent for Charles's son, Louis 
d'Outremer, or " Louis from beyond the Sea," whom 
he placed on the throne. The mother of Louis was 
a sister of Athelstan, king of England, and therefore 
a granddaughter of Alfred the Great. The remaining 
reigns of the Carlovingian kings are nothing but a 



56 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

series of struggles between them and the nobles for 
power. Louis IV. was a prince of some ability, but 
he could not stem the tide which had now grown too 
strong for him. His son Lothaire and his grandson 
Louis V. had short reisrns which resulted in nothing, 
the latter receiving: the title of Le Faineant or Do- 
Nothino-, not so much as a term of reproach as because 
his short reign of one year gave him no chance to 
accomplish anything. Although he left no children, 
an heir to the crown existed in the person of the Duke 
of Lorraine, brother of King Lothaire, but his claim 
was set aside by the unanimous voice of the nobles, 
who chose one of their own number, Hugh Oapet, son 
of Hugh the Great, to sit upon the throne of Char- 
lemaofne. 

Thus ended the line of Oarlovingian Kings, who 
becran so gloriously and finished so sadly. Who could 
have guessed, when the great Emperor was placed in 
his stately tomb, that in less than two hundred years 
his place would be filled by a stranger ? And yet it 
was better for France that it should be so. The well- 
meaning but helpless monarchs who pass in a sad pro- 
cession before us could do nothing to protect their 
subjects from each other,* and the nobles exercised an 
independent authority over those under them which 
made the name of king almost a mockery. To under- 
stand how this state of things came about, requires 
some knowledge of an institution called the Feudal 
System, which I will try to explain to you. 

In the early times, when a barbarian chief took pos- 
session of a country and turned out its inhabitants, it 
was the custom for him to, divide the land among the 



THE LATER CARLOVJNGIANS. 57 

principal men who had helped him to conquer it, on 
condition that they should be always ready to go with 
him to war when he called upon them, and to help in 
some other ways, according to the agreement they 
made with him. This was called owino- alle2:iance to 
him, and he was called the liege-lord, while the one 
who received the land was called his vassal, and the 
property itself a fief. 

After a time, when it became inconvenient to take 
care of so much land, the person who had received it 
from the chief, or king, divided it into smaller parts, 
and gave it to other people called freeholders, on the 
same terms. But as these again might be called upon 
at any time to go with their liege-lord to battle, they 
had under them a still lower class called serfs, who 
tilled the ground, and were not required to go to war 
unless some great or unusual event made it necessary. 
Thus there were four very distinct classes in the Feu- 
dal System: first, the king; then the great nobles who 
received their land directly from him, and the lesser 
ones to whom they granted it in turn; next the lower 
vassals, who were generally plain farmers; and lastly, 
the serfs. It was natural that in the course of time 
many of the great vassals, who owned perhaps more 
land than the king himself, should become impatient of 
being bound to &erve him, and should try to make 
themselves independent, and this gave the kings of 
France much trouble, until, as happened in the end, 
one fief after another fell into their hands, and they 
found themselves sole lords over the whole country. 

As the vassals, or tenants, paid no rent for their 
lands, it was necessary to have some form which should 



58 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

show that these lands really belonged to the superior or 
feudal lord. This was done by what was called homage, 
or an acknowledgment, at certain times, of the condi- 
tion of a vassal. We have seen how this ceremony 
was performed in the case of poor Simple Charles, who 
so well deserved his name. In later times the form 
was different. Instead of kissing his liege-lord's foot, 
the vassal placed his folded hands within those of his 
superior, the latter thus taking possession, by a symbol 
or sign, of all that the other was enjoying the use of. 




GHAPTEB VII. 

THE FIEST CAPETIANS. 9(|7 1108. 

T is well to understand at first setting out, 
that the only part of France entirely subject 
to Hugh Capet was a small district around 
Paris. The rest of the kingdom really belonged to 
various counts and dukes, those of Normandy, Brit- 
tany, Burgundy, and so on, who owed allegiance to 
the Kino" of France, but ruled their own dominions 
without interference from him, acknowledging his 
lordship over them only by doing homage for the 
countries they held by his permission. 

The feeling entertained towards Hugh by other, 
nobles who imagined that they had as good a right to 
the throne as he had, is shown by the answer made to 
him by an insolent noble who had taken possession of 
the country around Tours without his consent. " Who 



THE FIRST CAPETIANS. 59 

made you count?" he inquired. "Who made you 
king?" retorted the other, and the king was too 
cautious to press the matter further. 

Hugh reigned only nine years, but long enough to 
acquire and well enough to preserve the respect and 
admiration of all his vassals. He was especially de- 
voted to the church, giving up to it several rich abbeys 
bolonging to his own family, and thus making friends 
of the clergy, who bestowed on him the title of " De- 
fender of the Church." He very wisely had his son 
Robert joined with him as king during his own life-time, 
and acknowledged by the nobles, so that there could 
be no doubt about the succession. Such was the first 
of the Capetian Kings, some of whose descendants are 
living at this moment, and perhaps still hope to occupy 
the throne of France. 

Robert the Pious, as he was called, was a gentle 
and peace-loving man, and yet destined, as such men 
are apt to be if they become kings, to a stormy reign. 
He had married his cousin Bertha, to whom he was 
most tenderly attached; but though the relationship 
between them was very distant, the pope ordered them 
to separate, because such marriages are forbidden in 
the Romish Church. Robert protested in vain against 
this act of injustice, and it was not until after the pope 
had made both himself and Bertha very wretched that 
he consented to a separation. He then married a friv- 
olous and light-minded woman called Constance, who 
hated his pious ways, and would have liked to see him 
as vain and selfish as she was. Poor Kino;- Robert was 
so much in dread of her scoldings that he tried to con- 
ceal his good deeds from her as if they had been crimes. 



60 mSTORY OF FRANCE. 

She was always spying about to see if she missed any- 
thing from his dress, for if he had no money, he would 
give away the very clothes he had on. Once when he 
came home from mass, he found that his wife had 
trimmed his lance with silver ornaments. Instead of 
being gratified by this, he instantly began to think 
whether there was not some one to whom that silver 
might be useful. Just then a beggar came along and 
the king sent for a tool to take off the ornaments, 
which he gave to the beggar, telling him to take good 
care that the queen knew nothing of it. When Con- 
stance came in she exclaimed loudly at seeing the lance 
stripped of its silver, but the king declared that he did 
not know how it happened. With all his good quali- 
ties, it seems that he hadn't the courage to tell the 
truth. 

At another time, when he was at supper with her^ 
and was feeding a poor man under the table (for he 
insisted on having his doors open to all who chose to 
ask a meal), the beggar cut off a gold tag weighing six 
ounces that hung at the king's knee, and made off with 
it. When they rose from the table Constance instantly 
missed it, and went into one of her furies. The king- 
answered with great coolness that it was doubtless 
more needful to the one that took it than it was to him- 
self. A robber was once cutting off the heavy gold 
fringe from his mantle as he knelt in church, but though 
Robert knew perfectly well what the man was about, 
he said nothing until he had taken half of it; then he 
remarked mildly, " That will do, my friend; now go, 
and leave the rest for some one else." 

You may imagine that such a man was somewhat of 



THE FIRST CAPETIANS. 61 

a trial to a "oolish woman whose mind was set on dress 
and fashion, but her ways were still more trying to 
him. A crowd of young nobles had followed her 
from Toulouse, and scandalized the grave people of 
the northern court, one of whom thus discourses 
about them: " Their manners and dress were dis- 
orderly. . . . In the middle part of their heads 
they had no hair, and their beards were cut in the 
shape of clowns'. Their leggings and buskins were 
shamefully fashioned. . . . But oh, grief ! their 
abominable examples were immediately copied by the 
whole race of Frenchmen!" 

Robert was passionately fond of music,sang well, 
and wrote many hymns. The queen, thinking that 
she might turn his musical and poetical talent to some 
account, asked him to compose a song in her honor. 
So he sang a Latin hymn beginning, " Oh, Constantia 
Martyrum" — "Oh, constancy of the martyrs!" and as 
she heard her own name in it she was quite satisfied, 
and did not know that he was making fun of her. 

In the early part of King Robert's reign a remark- 
able state of feeling prevailed all over the Christian 
world. From a passage in the Book of Revelation 
people had drawn the conclusion that the world would 
come to an end a thousand years after Christ; and as 
the year 1000 drew near, their minds grew more and 
more ao'itated. It was not strano-e that a feelino* of 
terror should prevail at the thought of an approach- 
ing judgment, for never since the time of Christ had 
there been such frightful wickedness in the earth. 
Even the Church, which ouo-ht to have been the o-uar- 
dian of all that was good, and to have shone out like 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



a light in the darkness, had become so corrupt that the 
behavior of the monks and clergy was a dishonor to 
religion; and though there were noble exceptions, it 
was known to all how far many t)f them had fallen 
below the true standard. But now all were aroused; 
men gave up their business and prostrated themselves 
in the churches; property of all kinds, including 
money, jewels, houses and lands, was hastily given to 
the cathedrals and monasteries, in the hope that such 
sacrifices might purchase favor at the great day, and 
the tremblins: sinners waited with awe for the end 
to come. 

When the last day of the thousand years had drawn 
to its close and a new century dawned upon them, the 
people began to take heart again. For a while the 
excitement was still kept up, under the idea that there 
might be some mistake in the reckoning ; but gradually 
the terrified spirits of men grew calmer, and they 
returned slowly to their old habits. The terror they 
had felt, however, was not without its good efifect. For 
a long time there was less violence ; many monasteries 
and churches were built, and the clergy reformed, to 
some extent, their evil lives. 

As was usual in times of great religious excitement, 
the enthusiasm of piety sought re]ief in the most 
dreadful persecutions, in which King Robert joined, 
no doubt believing that he was doing his duty. The 
unhappy Jews, always the first mark for such attacks, 
were hunted out from their hiding places, imprisoned, 
tortured, robbed, and put to the most cruel deaths, all 
under the mask of love to God. When all who could 
not escape had suffered thus, the rage of persecution 



THE FIRST CAPETIANS. 63 

took a new turn, and seized upon some heretics at 
Orleans, one of whom had been confesGor to Queen 
Constance. As he was led to the stake^ the queen 
stood in the place where he was to pass, and struck 
him so furiously in the face with her iron -pointed 
staff that one of his eyes was dashed from its socket. 
A pleasant woman, this, to pass one's life with ! 

In the last year of King Robert's reign, and for two 
years afterwards, a famine prevailed in France, the 
details of which equal in horror anything that we read 
of. The harvests failed for three years in succession, 
and the destitution of the poorer classes reached such 
a pass that human flesh became a well-known article 
of food. The graveyards were robbed, corpses were 
ravenously devoured, and an inn-keeper was burnt 
alive for having killed nearly fifty of his guests and 
used their bodies for food. It was said that people 
set traps in the woods to catch little children, so that 
their flesh might be eaten. It was not safe to travel 
in the highways, lest some wretch, stronger than 
yourself, might fall upon and kill you. As always 
happens in times of famine, pestilence was added to 
its torments. When food is deficient or poor in quality 
it causes sickness, and these poor unfortunates would 
sometimes mix powdered chalk with the little flour 
they had to make it go further; but there was still one 
more horror to be added to the list. There was a 
famine among the wild beasts, too, and the wolves 
grew so fierce and bold that they would roam 
through the country, attracted by the unburied 
corpses, and when these had been devoured, they 
began to attack human beings, who, weakened by 



64 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

hunger, were not always able to defend themselves. 

In the fourth year there came a change. The crop, 
which the people had managed to sow in spite of the 
scarcity of grain, was abundant, and prosperity 
returned to the country. While men's hearts were 
still in the softened state brought about by gratitude 
for deliverance from danger, a very singular law, called 
the "Peace of God," was passed by the church, with 
consent of the king. This forbade the shedding of 
blood, whether in revenge or open warfare; it exhorted 
all men to live according to the religion of Christ, to 
use no violence one towards another, and to be just 
and merciful to all. 

This law was hailed with delight by all classes, but 
it could not last long. Oppression and outrage be- 
came common again, and murders went on as before. 
Then another experiment was tried, called the "Truce 
of God," which worked better. From Wednesday even- 
ing in each week until Monday morning of the next, 
and all through Lent and Advent, men were to give 
up stabbing and mangling one another; and from 
being restricted in this way, they grew somewhat out 
of the habit of violence, and the condition of society 
was changed for the better. These things may give 
you an idea of the simplicity of both rulers and peo- 
ple in the eleventh century. 

Two very long reigns followed that of King Robert 
the Pious, occupying nearly eighty years between 
them, — that of his son, Henry the First and his grand- 
son, Philip the First. Henry seems not to have been 
much distinguished in any way ; Philip was a man of 
whom we know little but what is bad. It was in his 



THE FIRST CAPETIANS. 65 

reio-ii that the first of those wonderful Crusades was 
undertaken, the object of which was to recover Jeru- 
salem from the Turks. Peter the Hermit, the monk 
whose zeal enlisted immense armies under the standard 
of the Cross, was a native of France, and by far the 
larger number of the brave chiefs who led their sol- 
diers to Palestine were Frenchmen. As it was the 
custom in those days for kings to march at the head of 
their armies, this mighty host would naturally have 
looked to Philip as their leader ; but besides his being 
very lazy and self-indulgent, he was known to live in 
so scandalous a manner that he would not have dared 
to offer himself for such a position. So the Cru- 
saders went without him ; and when in 1099, the Holy 
City was taken by the triumphant Christians, Philip 
shared in none of the glory of the achievement. 

Towards the end of his long reign of nearly fifty 
years, he professed to feel sorry for his misdeeds, 
though he did not reform his life; and by way of 
atonement he ordered that his body should be buried 
in an obscure country church, because he was not 
worthy to be buried with the kings of his race in the 
Cathedral of St. Denis. It would have been better if 
his repentance had taken the form of forsaking his sins, 
and atoning for wrongs by undoing them. 

There have been few periods in the history of 
France which present so dreary a picture to our view 
as does this reign of the first Philip. To be a baron or 
" noble " was only another name for enjoying the 
privilege of living at other people's expense. These 
nobles built strong castles which defied the attack of 
even the king's armies, and became too often mere 
5 



66 HISTORY OF B' RANGE. 

dens of robbers. Men who preferred living on the 
fruits of their neighbors' industry to earning their own 
bread, had only to start out at the head of a body of re- 
tainers whom they kept for the purpose, rob and murder 
travelers on the public roads, and take by force the 
cattle which a poor laborer had been toiling for years 
to buy, or the harvest on which he depended for the 
support of his family, to live at ease and bring up a 
a family of sons to do just as their fathers had done. 
But a brighter day was about to dawn on the unhappy 
country, and a reign of peace and order to succeed 
this one of dire confusion and miserv. 




CHAPTER YIII. 

LOTJIS VT. AND HIS SOX. — 1108-1180. 

T was fortunate for the country that the son 
of Philip the First was so different from 
Philip himself as to be called, in his young- 
days, the Wide-Awake. In his later years this sur- 
name was changed to Le Gros, or The Fat, by which 
he is known in history; but in spite of his unwieldy 
size, he was the most active and vigorous king that 
France bad seen for more than a hundred years. 

To improve the condition of the people generally, it 
was necessary that he should begin by controlling the 
great nobles; and as he was not strong enough alone 
to accomplish this, he showed his wisdom by calling to 
his assistance the two classes who were the most inter- 



LOUIS VI. AND HIS SON. 67 



ested in his doing it — the clergy and the common peo- 
ple. He encouraged the latter to form themselves into 
associations called commimes, (very different from the 
lawless rabble who have taken that name at different 
times in the present century), and under promise of 
his protection they were glad to fight for him against 
the robber-barons who had so long preyed upon them. 
The property belonging to the Church consisted mostly 
of lands which the bishops rented out to small farmers, 
or v^hich were tilled by their own serfs; and in furnish- 
ing these men with weapons and sending them out to 
fight the king's battles, the clergy were strengthening 
their own power, and saving their own possessions 
from destruction. 

So all worked together, and in a few years Louis 
had put down the most of the robber-barons, and let 
them see that he was a king in fact as well as in 
name; one by one they yielded to him, though gener- 
ally not until after hard fighting and a good deal of 
boasting on their part. Before they were all con- 
quered the king had grown so enormously stout, in 
spite of his active habits, that he could scarcely mount 
his horse, and many a man would have thought this a 
good excuse for staying at home and sending some- 
body else to do the fighting; but Louis, though he had 
no Benjamin Franklin to tell him, " When you want 
a thing done, do it yourself," acted upon this plan, and 
was always to be found in the front of an attack. He 
had the advantage of a very wise and able minister 
called Suger, whose advice was most valuable both to 
him and to his son, Louis the Seventh, who succeeded 
him. The latter, who, though he reigned forty-three 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



yciui'H, IB always spokoii of as " Lo Jeuno," — " Tho 
Young" — had just married a young hoiross called 
Eleanor of Aquitaine, and was hastening towards 
Paris when news was brought him of his fatlier's 
death. Ho was startled at finding himself suddenly 
placed in so responsible a position; but he had the 
good Suger to lean upon, and ruxturally expected a 
h;i])py and prosperous life. It is fortunate that wcj 
can not see what is before us; for if the poor young 
king could have known half the disai)pointments and 
mortifications that were in store for him he would 
hardly have dared to begin his reign at all. Ilis first 
trouble came IVom a iK^ighbor who was very apt to 
make trouble in those days — the Pope. 

Prom the days of Gregory tho Seventh (Ilildebrand,) 
the popes had b'ion growing stronger and more able to 
do as they pleased ; and when one of the bishops in 
France died, it |)leaHr!(l Pope Innocent the Second to 
appoint one of his own nephews to fill the place. Louis, 
young as he was, knew that this was a thing whi(!h tho 
Pope had no right to do, and resisted it with all his 
might, nominjiting some one else, and declaring that while 
he was above ground, no Pope should take such a liberty 
with him. In return, the Pope excommunicated him, 
which was no light matter at that time ; but Louis held 
out until an accident happened so horrible that it made 
him almost crazy, and ready to give up to the Pope or 
any one else. 

One of Louis's great vassals having taken the part of 
the Pope, the king went against him with an army just 
as his father Ix)uis the Sixth would have done. In the 
course of the war Louis attacked and took the town of „ 



1 



LOUIS VI. AND HIS SON. 69 

Vitry, wliich was set on fire by his troops. Thirteen 
liiiiidred pf'.oplc — rn(!n, womon and children — had 
crowded into the great cliiircli to Ix; safe from the sol- 
(Jicirs; tlie flames caught the l)tiilding, and the whole 
niiiiil): !• peri,<h(}d by this liorrible death, while Louis 
looked on in despair, iieipless to save. 

It hc;(;iii(m1 as if tlie king's heart was broken. II(j 
gr(;w wretciiedly low-B[)irited, gave up all th(5 advan- 
tagciS he had gained over liis nibellious vassal, and was 
ghid to make peace with tiu^ I'ojx^ by asking pardon, 
and allowing Innocent's n(;[)h(;w t(j be made bishop — 
a tiling he had swoi'n never to do. Still, all this did 
not easii his mind; luj had broken his oath on the one 
side, lie had made war for thrcic yciars against His Holi- 
ness the Pope on tlui oth(!r. Whichever- way he looked, 
h(^ felt like a miserable sinner; and just at the tinu! 
when his heart was utterly failing him, a way was 
ojxMied, as he thought, in which he might atone for all 
his sln:^; St. Bsrnard was stirring up men's minds to 
j»() on th(i scicond Crusade. 

.Icrusahim, tlu; holy city, was still in the hands of 
the Christians, but great outrages had been committed 
jigainst them in other parts of Pahistine, and Kdessa, 
one of their citi(iS, had beisn taken under circumstances 
oT great cru(dty. So wIhmi St. Bernard spok(5 in a 
gr(;at [)ublic asseml)ly to the French king and his no- 
bles and to countless thousands who crowded around 
to hear him, of the duty oi' Christians in this matter, 
one long shout arose from all — "The cross! the cross!" 
IJiirnard and the monks had prepared beforehand a 
great quantity of crosses made of red cloth, ready to 
(!W fast to the clothes (jf those who wished to go on 



70 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the crusade; the king, who saw in this the opportunity 
of easing his burdened soul, was the first to kneel 
down and receive the sacred symbol; the queen, who 
was by no means religious, but ready for anything that 
promised excitement and novelty, insisted upon taking 
the cross likewise: and after them followed a brilliant 
throno- of nobles, both men and women, and immense 
numbers of the common people. When all the ready- 
made crosses had been given away, the saint and the 
monks who attended him tore their garments in pieces 
to supply the still increasing demand. 

It was in vain that Suger advised the king against 
this rash undertaking, and tried to persuade him that 
it was his duty to stay at home and take care of his 
kino;dom. Louis was both ashamed and afraid to draw 
back, and knowing that his queen would give him no 
peace if he did not go, raised an army of a hundred 
thousand fighting men, accompanied, as was then the 
custom, by another army of hangers-on who did no 
good and only hindered the march. It seems strange 
that sensible men should not have known that a rabble 
of women, children and idlers, who had to be fed and 
sheltered, was not of any more use on a crusade than 
it would have been if the kings had been fighting one 
another at home; but the world in general became in- 
sane the moment that Jerusalem was mentioned, and 
no one dared to stop the crowds who professed to be 
moved solely by the love of God and a desire to do 
honor to his cause. 

Alas for the vanity of human expectations! the end 
of the mighty crusade entered upon by that vast host 
in the pride of their strength and hope, was one of 



LOUIS VI. AND HIS SON. 71 

the most dismal failures recorded in history. Betrayed 
by the Greek emperor at Constantinople who had 
promised to help him, obliged to abandon the main 
body of his army (who were either massacred, forced 
to turn Mahometans or sold as slaves), and cut to the 
heart by the misconduct of his wife, who was a woman 
whom nobody could respect, Louis passed two miserable 
years in Palestine, ashamed to present himself again 
before the people of France, who had witnessed his bril- 
liant departure. At length, yielding to the urgent en- 
treaties of Suger, and thinking, perhaps, that Queen 
Eleanor would behave better at home than she did 
abroad, he came back to his own country with a scanty 
band of two or three hundred knights — the sole rem- 
nant of the mighty host who had set out with him for 
Palestine in all the glory of their fresh hopes so 
short a time before. 

Louis returned from misfortune abroad only to fresh 
misfortune at home. The haughty and insolent 
Eleanor professed to despise him because he had 
shown so little wisdom in respect to the crusade, 
called him a coward, and loudly demanded a divorce. 
Louis, who was naturally disgusted with her behavior, 
weakly yielded to this measure, which could not have 
been accomplished without his consent; and in six 
weeks»he had the mortification of seeing the rich pos- 
sessions which made up more than half of his own king- 
dom pass into the hands of his rival, Henry the Second 
of England, who was quite willing to take Eleanor 
with all her faults, for the sake of the countries she 
brought with her. We know from English history 
how unhappy she made him, but that did not helj) 



72 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Louis, who must have felt that she had outwitted him. 
Here again he acted against the advice of" Suger, who 
would gladly have persuaded him to overlook what he 
could not prevent. The faithful minister, died before 
their separation; and it is a proof of the inconsistency 
of human bein(>:s that he was even then meditatincr 
another crusade, to be led by himself, which should 
retrieve the disgcrace of the last one! 

The rest of Louis's long reign was diversified with 
frequent quarrels between himself and Henry H., in 
which the crafty Englishman invariably gained the 
victory in the end. Loais did what mischief he could 
by encouraging the frequent rebellions of Henry's sons 
against their father, but he could not prevent the 
family of Plantagenet from getting and keeping, in one 
way or another, a large part of France. Normandy 
had come to them from William the Conqueror, and 
the great country or earldom of Anjou from Geoffrey 
Plantagenet, father of Henry the Second, while Con- 
stance of Brittany, who married Henry's son Geoffrey, 
brought the duchy of Brittany into the family as her 
marriage portion. With all these slices taken off, but 
very little of what we now call France remained in the 
hands of Louis the Seventh. 

It was in his reign that the oriflamme was first used at 
the head of the French armies. This was a red silk 
banner with tongues or flames of gold upon it, and had 
belono-ed to the Cathedral of St. Denis. Louis took a 
fancy to it and adopted it as the national flag of France, 
where it continued in use for centuries. 




PHILIP AUGUSTUS. LOUIS VIIL 73 

CHAPTER IX. 

PHILIP AUGUSTUS. LOUIS VIII. — 1180-122G. 

jHTLIP the Second, son of Louis the Seventh, 
received from his father the name of Dieu- 



donn^, or God-given, in token of the pleasure 
felt at his birth. It is uncertain how he came by that of 
Augustus, but it has clung firmly to him from his own 
time to this. Although only fifteen years old at the 
time of his father's death, he assumed at oncethe posi- 
tion of a man, took the government into his own hands, 
and married Isabella of Hainault, a descendant of the 
last of the Carlovingians. This was very gratifying to 
the French people, for the name of Charlemagne was 
<learer to them than any other, and they felt that he 
had thus, in a manner, come back to them. 

Philip began his reign with one steady purpose in 
his heart — that of doino; all he could to brinor down 
the pride and lessen the power of Henry Plantagenet, 
king of England. On the boundary line between Nor- 
mandy and France there stood a magnificent elm tree, 
under the shade of whose spreading branches it was 
said that three hundred men could find shelter. This 
had been a favorite place of meeting for king Louis 
and Llenry II.; and Philip, who was sometimes present 
at these talks, used to be secretly enraged at hearing 
how his simple-minded father was overreached by the 
cunning Henry, so he determined that when it came his 
turn to reign he would " pay him back." They had 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



many bitter quarrels, and at last, in a fit of passion, 
Philip had the grand old elm cut down, so that no 
more talking about peace might be done under it. If 
he had let it alone it might have been there to this 
day. 

From the very beginning, Philip was intensely anx- 
ious for the glory and advancement of his country. 
After he became king, he was once observed to be biting 
and gnawing at a piece of green bough he held in his 
hand, evidently forgetting every thing around him, and 
one of the courtiers ventured to ask him what he was 
thinking of. " I am thinking," said the king, " of a 
certain matter ; and that is, whether God will give me, 
or one of my heirs, grace to raise France to the height 
it was at in the time of Charlemagne." It was not pos- 
sible for any man in the twelfth century to make France 
what it had been in the time of Charlemagne; but 
Philip Agustus did one thing which Charlemagne had 
iailed in ; he left his kingdom so firmly bound together 
that it did not split apart at his death. 

"When Philip had been reigning seven years, the 
proposition for a third crusade set all Europe in a fer- 
ment once more, and he was one of the first to take 
the cross. In one of those short intervals when he was 
on friendly terms with Richard Coeur de Lion, they 
agreed to go to the Holy Land together; but when 
there, Richard's haughty bearing so disgusted Philip 
that he left his companion in arms to finish the crusade 
by himself, and came home with the greater part of 
his army. French historians defend his action in this 
matter, but it is highly probable that the hot-tempered 
Richard thought him a coward and a sneak, though he 



PHILIP AUGUSTUS. LOUIS VIII. 75 

did not say so. They parted civilly enough, and Philip 
took a solemn oath before leaving Palestine that he 
would respect the rights of his brother of England, 
and do him no mischief in his absence. 

He was not the man, however, to keep an oath when 
anything waS/to be made by breaking it, and we hear 
of him at Rome, on the way home, asking the pope to 
absolve him from his vow. His first business after his 
return was to enter into a close friendship with Prince 
John of England, Richard''s brother, and to encourage 
him to rebellion by every means in his power. We all 
know how it fared with Richard on his return; how he 
was shipwrecked, and taken captive and kept in prison 
in Germany; how Philip and John were plotting to- 
gether against him all this time, and how, when he 
escaped at last, the false friend wrote to the false 
brother, " Take care of yourself, for the devil has 
broken loose." After this there could be no longer 
even a pretence of friendship between the two kings, 
but the death of Richard relieved Philip from his worst 
enemy, and quickly deserting the new king, John, he 
took up the cause of Arthur of Brittany, who was the 
rightful heir to the English throne. 

It soon became plain that he had not supported the 
claim of this young man from any love of justice, but 
only to injure and weaken King John ; for when the 
latter proposed that Philip's son Louis should marry 
Blanche of Castile, a niece of John, the French king 
immediately forgot all about Arthur's rights, and left 
him to do the best he could for himself. As if every 
thing played into Philip's hands, the cold-blooded mur- 
der of the young prince by his uncle John soon offer- 



76 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

ed an excuse for attacking the latter again, and the 
remainder of John's reign was only a series of strug- 
gles against his powerful enemy. The final struggle 
took place at the battle of Bouvines, in Flanders, 
where Philip won a splendid victory which placed him 
at the height of power and glory. 

This was the end of his fighting. He spent the rest 
of his life in making secure what he had gained, and 
in improving, in every possible way, the condition of 
his country and his people. We can hardly realize at 
this day the' difference between France as he left it 
and France as he found it. Many institutions of learn- 
ing were founded or encouraged by him, and such 
works as public aqueducts, markets, hospitals, and 
churches still remain to show how intelligently he used 
the money furnished him by his people. 

The city of Paris, where he lived, was especially 
the object of his care. He found it neglected and 
filthy, its narrow streets choked up by rubbish, and 
dirty animals quite as much at home there as human 
beings. His uncle, the elder brother of Louis the 
Seventh, had been killed by his horse stumbling over 
one of the pigs which were then allowed to roam at 
liberty through the streets of the capital. Philip 
changed all this. As he was standing one day at his 
palace window, watching the flow of the river Seine, 
he was almost stifled by the foul odors, that came to 
him from the streets, and turning away in disgust, the 
idea occurred to him that he would have the streets 
paved with stone, which was partly carried out in his 
own time. He wished to clear Paris of its old name, 
Lutetia, which as I told you meant "mud-town." He 



PHILIP AUGUSTUS. LOUIS VIII. 77 

corapletod the grand old church of Notre Dame, 
which stands on an island in the Seine that once 
cont':iined the whole city of Paris, and enlarged and 
repaired the palace of the Louvre, which still stands 
to attest his masrnificence. 

The crusades against the Mahometans were not the 
only ones undertaken in that ferocious age. There 
was a frightful persecution of the Jews by Philip's 
orders, and an equally terrible war against the Albi- 
genses, a simple-minded and harmless people who 
liv^ed in the district around Albi, a city of the beauti- 
ful country called Languedoc, in the south of France. 
Here a sect of Christians had sprung up who differed 
in doctrine from the Catholic Church, and who, seeing 
that in many things the lives of the monks were not 
what they ought to be, openly reproached them for 
their shortcomings. They were, in fact, a sort of 
Protestants, and Innocent III. ordered that they 
should be treated like infidels, giving the charge of 
the expedition against them to Simon de Montfort, 
a brave but cruel man, who had already been on a 
crusade and knew how such thino-s were done. 

This leader was the father of that famous Simon de 
Montfort who plays such an important part in the his- 
tory of England in the time of Henry III. He thought 
that the best thing to do with heretics was to burn or 
hang them ; so he was a man after Innocent's own heart. 
Armed with the Pope's authority, he collected a large 
army and marched against the Albigenses as if they had 
been Turks. No mercy was shown. When the Cru- 
saders were about to attack a large city which contained 
both heretics and good Catholics, some one asked a 



78 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

priest who was with SimoD, what should be done about 
it. " Kill them all ! " was the savage auswer ; " the 
Lord will know his own ! " Not a living soul was 
spared ; men, women and children were slaughtered like 
wild beasts, and after the city had been given up to the 
soldiers to plunder, it was set on fire, and soon nothing 
remained of it but heaps of ashes. 

This was a specimen of the whole war. One would 
think in reading about it that the crusaders had been 
American Indians in disguise, so little humanity did 
they show. It would be too heart-rending to relate all 
they did; but one passage, taken from a writer who lived 
at that time, will give some idea of their w^ay of making 
w^ar. "After the taking of the castle of Lavaur, Amaur}^, 
Lord of Montreal, and eighty other knights were dragged 
out from it, the noble Count Simon commanding that 
they should all be hung on one gibbet. But when 
Amaury, the most important man among them, was 
hung, the gallows fell, not having been firmly fixed in 
the ground, owing to the great haste. The Count, seeing 
that this would cause much delay, ordered that the 
others should have their throats cut, and the pilgrims 
joyfully fell upon them and massacred them all on the 
spot. The iady of the castle, Amaury 's sister, and a 
very wicked heretic, was, by the Count's orders, thrown 
into a well, which was filled up with stones. Finally 
our crusaders gathered together the innumerable her- 
etics who were in the castle, and burned them alive with 
extreme joy." 

And this was done in the name of the religion of 
Christ ! 

Philip Augustus was too wise a man not to disap- 



PHILIP AUGUSTUS. LOUIS VIIL 79 



prove of such horrid deeds, and was much displeased 
that the Pope should thus intrude upon his dominions 
and make war upon his vassals, but he did not venture 
to quarrel with him, especially as he needed all his 
strength to fight King John. So he remained passive 
while Simon de Montfort went on triumphantly kill- 
ing, burning and destroying; the Pope all the while 
encouraging the Crusaders, and promising Heaven to 
those who fell, and a share in the land to those who 
conquered; and alter the lovely valleys of Languedoc 
and Provence had been made desolate, the people 
silenced and their rulers killed or forced to submit, 
the war was declared to be at an end. " He made a 
solitude and called it Peace." 

Another enterprise which Philip H. permitted 
rather than encourao-ed, was an invasion of Eno;land 
undertaken by his son, afterward Louis YIII. 
The English barons, disgusted by the behavior of King- 
John, invited the young prince to take his place. 
Louis collected an army and landed in England, where 
he was warmly welcomed; but the death of King John 
soon afterward turned the hearts of the people 
towards his son Henrj^, a boy of nine years old, who 
had done them no wrong, and Louis was civilly dis- 
missed. 

Louis the Eighth reigned only three years, and is 
known in history chiefly as being the son of a great 
father, the father of an excellent son, and the husband 
of the most admirable woman of her time, Blanche 
of Castile, who was left Regent of the Kingdom at 
his death, his son Louis the Ninth being then only 
twelve years old. 



80 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

The proud noblemen who had been kept down by 
the firm hand of Philip Augustus did not at all relish 
the idea of being subject to a child who was himself 
under the authority of a woman; but Blanche of 
Castile seemed to have been born on purpose to hold 
just the position she did. She had great good sense and 
a strong will, joined with elegant manners, and a certain 
useful quality called tact^ which enables people to go 
through the world without giving offence. So, 
although the great lords began by forming parties 
ai^ainst her, she manasred to steer clear of difficulties, 
or when she met them, she overcame them so skill- 
fully that her enemies hardly perceived that she had 
got the better of them. 

According to the custom of the time. Queen 
Blanche selected a wife for her son — a beautiful girl 
called Marguerite, daughter of the Count of Provence. 
We know little about this young lady, except that 
Louis was very fond of her; and as he was of a most 
noble character himself, we take it for granted that 
she was endowed w^ith all womanly virtues. The 
queen-mother, wise and good as she was, could not 
help being a little jealous of her daughter-in-law, 
fearing that her society would make king Louis forget 
his duties. One of the lords of the court called 
Joinville, has left us a most interesting sketch of Louis 
the Ninth, and tells some amusing stories about the 
way in which his mother continued to rule him, even 
after he was a man o-rown. 

She kept such a close watch upon him and his wife 
that they could scarcely ever talk together, except in 
secret, and one of their plans to escape her vigilance 



Sr. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 81 

shows considerable ingenuity. They had apartments 
one over the other in different stories of the same pal- 
ace, an inner staircase leading from one to the other, 
and on this stairway they would meet and have their 
talks together without interruption. They took the 
sentinels at the doors into their confidence, and when 
Queen Blanche was approaching to pay either of them 
a visit, these men had orders to knock on the floor 
with their staves, or make some unusual noise, to let 
the royal pair know who was coming. Then we can 
imagine them scampering away to their own rooms, 
where the king would perhaps be found reading his 
book, and the queen busy with her embroidery. It 
must have been very comical to all who were in the 
secret. 



CHAPTEB X. 

ST. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 1226-1285. 




T is not likely that any of the brilliant com- 
pany who were assembled at the wedding of 
Louis and the charming Marguerite, thought 
that the title of saint would ever be added to his name. 
He was nineteen years old, handsome, refined-looking 
and graceful; well educated according to the ideas of 
his time, and fond of such amusements as were then 
customary among gentlemen — hunting, hawking, and 
various kinds of games. He had a taste also for fine 
clothes and elegant furniture, not unbecoming to his 
years and station. 
6 



82 III ST OB Y OF FRANCE. 

After his marriage, however, he seemed to lose his 
interest in outside amusements. He gave up, of his 
own accord, the pleasures he had taken so much delight 
in; replaced his costly clothes by a simpler dress, and 
found in the enjoyments of home and the cares of pub- 
lic business ample occupation for all the hours not oc- 
cupied in devotion. From his childhood he showed a 
sincere and fervent piety, and his mother had brought 
him up in the feeling that it was better and nobler to 
do what was right than to acquire any earthly gain or 
glory. Yet he did not neglect the affairs of his king- 
dom. He lost no opportunity of securing advantages 
for his country when he could do so honestly, and by 
wisdom and firmness succeeded in brino-ing- all the 
great vassals into obedience. 

A good king, a good neighbor, a good husband and 
father, a good son, — w^hat a pity that he could not 
have been content to go on and lead his whole life ac- 
cordino- to that excellent beorinnino- ! But the same 
spirit of devotion to duty which had been his ruling- 
principle through life, made him think that he ought to 
go on a crusade. Horrible things were happening in 
Asia. It was not only the Saracens who were now 
opposing the Christians there, but also a new army of | 
people, the Mongol Tartars ; barbarians who amused 
themselves after a battle by making pyramids of the 
human heads they had cut off, and who caused money to 
be made with the word "Destruction" stamped up- 
on it. 

They meant what they said. . In a battle near Gazaj 
thirty thousand Christians had perished, and Jerusalem, 
then in the hands of the Mahometans, had been sack- 



ST. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 83 

ed with frightful carnage. The Latin Emperor of 
Constantinople begged St. Louis for help, and a severe 
illness which happened to him just at this time decided 
the question at once. While hovering between life 
and death, he made a vow to lead an army to the Holy 
Land if he should recover ; and though his wife and 
mother fell on their knees before him trying to per- 
suade him to give it up, and all the wisest men in his 
kingdom advised him against it, he persisted in doing 
what he thought was right. ^ 

It was the great mistake of his life. Though he 
spent several years in making preparations, the result 
of his expedition was a miserable failure. He went 
first to Egypt, where the Saracens were very strong; 
and when the fleet arrived at Damietta he leaped into 
the water in full armor and waded ashore, so eager 
was he to meet the enemy. The city was taken, but 
though there were plenty of brave men in the army, 
there was no great general, and Louis failed to make 
the most of his success. 

The crusaders advanced towards the city of Man- 
sourah, and a part of the army having with great diffi- 
culty forced their way into it, the enemy shut the gates 
behind tliem, and they were massacred, almost to a 
man, in its narrow streets. The remainder fought 
their way forward, sometimes gaining a victory; but 
the thousands of corpses lying un buried under a trop- 
ical sun caused a pestilence in the army, and there 
was nothing to do but retreat. The dead Saracens 
were even more destructive to them than the living 
ones. The enemy pursued the Christian host nearly 
to Damietta, and there the king, who was very ill 



84 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

from the effects of the climate, was made prisoner 
with his whole array. 

Many of these heroic men, — for they were heroes in 
spite of their mistakes — were immediately put to 
death; others were spared on condition of their 
turning Mahometans, and remaining among their 
enemies, and the richest were kept for enormous 
ransoms which their captors required of them. 
That of king Louis was fixed at a sum equal to 
about two millions of dollars in gold. Louis instant- 
ly promised to pay that sum for the release of his 
soldiers, adding that he would give the city of Da- 
mietta for his own ransom, as the value of a king could 
not be counted in money. The sultan was so much 
pleased with this generosity that he gave up, of his 
own accord, one-fifth of the sum of money demanded. 

The story of St. Louis's adventures in the East 
would fill a whole book, but we must pass them over 
with only a slight mention. The Queen went with 
him to the crusade, and when he was taken prisoner 
was for a while separated from him, which of course was 
a time of cruel anxiety to her. She told an old knight 
who was taking care of her, that he must take an oath 
to kill her if the city where she was should be taken by 
the Saracens, and was perhaps a little surprised when 
he assured her that she need not feel the slightest 
anxiety on that score for it was just what he had already 
made up his mind to do! She had a little son born 
under these painful circumstances who was called 
John, and was surnamed Tristan, or The Sad, in mem- 
ory of that dreadful time. , 

In his truce with the Sultan, Louis had agreed not 1 



ST. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 85 

to fight against him for ten years, but he could not bear 
to go back to France without having done something. 
He spent four years in Palestine, fortifying the towns in 
possession of the Christians, and helping them with 
money and kind actions of all sorts, and might have 
remained still longer but that news was brought to 
him of the death of Queen Blanche, who had been left 
as Regent in his absence. This was a great grief to 
him, for he loved her sincerely, and felt that he owed 
her a deep debt of gratitude. One of the last acts of 
her life had been to put down an uprising of the peas- 
ants, called Pastorals, who had committed frightful out- 
rages in France, especially towards the clergy. They 
were subdued, and Louis found his country quiet and 
prosperous, and his people delighted to welcome him 
back after his six years' absence. 

All who saw him, however, perceived with regret 
that his face bore marks of deep and settled sorrow. 
The old light-heartedness was gone ; a heavy weight 
seemed resting on his mind, and he still wore the red 
cross on his shoulder. Yet the fifteen years that fol- 
lowed his return were among the most beautiful of his 
life. He lived like a father among his people, dealing jus- 
tice equally to all. _ He is described as sitting at Vincen- 
nes under an oak tree, and letting all the common people 
who had anything to complain of, bring their troubles 
directly to him. He loved the office of peace-maker, 
and was never weary of reconciling his barons one 
to another, often making up from his private purse the 
loss which he decided should be borne by one of the 
parties. He strictl}?- forbade them to settle their dis- 
putes by battle, as had formerly been the custom, and 



86 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

made such just and equal laws that even the haughty 
peers were willing to abide by them. All people relied 
on him ; the clergy for his piety, the nobles for his jus- 
tice, the poor for his generosity and mercy ; and under 
him France became a model for the countries of the 
earth. 

But alas! the old shadow hung over the king; he 
never felt that his vow had been accomplished, and in 
spite of all that could be said against it, he resolved 
upon another crusade. It was so unpopular that the 
prudent Joinville considered himself justified in refus- 
ing to join it, but the influence of the king was great, 
and many knights felt that tbey would rather go with 
him, even to defeat, than stay behind in selfish peace 
and security. His invitation to his nobles to accom- 
pany him on one of his crusades has a touch of humor 
about it. " It was the custom to g-ive each courtier a 
new robe at Christmas. On Christmas Eve the kinof- 
bade all his court be present at early morning mass. 
At the chapel door each man received his new cloak, 
put it on, and went in. At first all was dark; but as 
the day rose, each saw the cross on his neighbor's 
shoulder." At first they were disposed to laugh at 
one another, but when they remembered that having 
once assumed the cross they could not draw back with- 
out shame, their faces grew long, for they would much 
have preferred staying at home. « 

Contrary to the wish of the Pope, Louis took three 
of his sons with him on his second crusade, the young- 
est being only seventeen years old. His own health 
was so feeble at the time that the journey was little 
better than an act of madness. Instead of going at 



ST. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 87 

once to the Holy Land, he landed at Tunis, on the 
coast of Africa, which was in possession of the Ma- 
hometans; but before there was time to do anything, 
and while the king was waiting for tlie arrival of his 
brother, a dreadful sickness, caused by the climate, 
broke out in the army. Poor John Tristan was one of 
the first to lay down his young life, and very soon the 
king was attacked also. He had little idea of getting 
well, and made his arrangements for death with the 
utmost calmness. He called his remaining sons to 
him, as well as his daughter Isabel and her husband, 
who had accomj^anied him, and gave them his last in- 
structions and his blessing, exhorting Prince Philip, 
who was to succeed him, to rule justly and in the fear 
of God. Then he caused a bed of ashes to be made 
on the floor, on which he was laid in token of humility 
and sorrow for sin; and on this he died, murmuring 
"Jerusalem! Jerusalem!" almost with his last breath. 

We should not get a good idea of St. Louis if we 
thought of him only as a king, and did not look into 
his family circle. We are told that "after supper his 
children followed him into his room, where they sat 
down around him; he instructed them in their duties, 
and then sent them away to bed. . . . When he 
had time he went to see them in their own apartment, 
inquired into the progress they were making in their 
studies, and gave them excellent instruction." 

He delighted, as all wise men have done, in the 
society of men of learning; and good old Joinville 
tells us, " When we were at court with him in private, 
he would sit at the foot of his bed; and if any one 
proposed reading aloud to him he would say, ' You 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



shall not read tome, for after dinner there is nothing 
so pleasant as talking freely, where every one can say 
what he likes.' .... I was twenty-two years 
in his company without ever having heard him use an 
oath. . . . Never did I hear him name the devil, 
except in reading some book where it was proper to 
name him. And it is a o-reat diso,Tace to the 
kingdom of France that one can hardly speak now 
without saying, ' The devil take it! ' In the Joinville 
household any one who utters such a word receives a 
box on the ears or a slap on the face, and bad language 
is thus almost entirely suppressed." 

The king was most severe against blasphemy, and 
appears to have invented several punishments for it. 
Joinville "saw a goldsmith placed by his orders on a 
ladder, in shirt and drawers, with a pig's entrails round 
his neck in such quantity that they reached to his 
nose. And I have heard," he goes on, " that he 
ordered a burgher of Paiis to be branded on the nose 
and under lip for the same offense; but I did not see 
that." When the king heard that complaints were 
made of this severity, he declared that he would be 
willing himself to be so branded, and to bear the shame 
of it all his life, if by so doing the sin of blasphemy 
might disappear from his dominions. 

The son who succeeded St. Louis was called Philip 
the Bold, though it is difficult to tell why, for he seems 
to have been an insignificant sort of person. He 
might have been called Philip the Sorrowful Avhen he 
came back from Tunis, for he brought with him five 
coffins containing the remains of his father, of John 
Tristan, of his brother in-law the king of Navarre, and 



Sr. LOUIS. PHILIP THE BOLD. 89 

of his own wife and his infant son, who had died on 
the way home. It must have boon a dreary time; and 
instead of the joyful appUiuse which usually greeted 
a kinof's return, a mournful silence reio-ned in the 
streets of Paris, as the funeral procession slowly took 
its way towards the cathedral of St. Denis. 

The chief interest of Philip's reign lies not so much 
in his own doings as in those of his uncle, Charles of 
Anjou, whose misgovern ment in Sicily was the cause 
of the hori-ible massacre known as " The Sicilian 
Vespers." The Pope had offered the crown of Sicily 
and Naples to St. Louis for one of his sons; but as 
that upright monarch would not take it from the 
rightful heir, it was next offered to his brother Charles, 
who accepted it without scruple. His tyranny so 
enraged the Sicilians that thev rose ao-ainst the French 
in the island and killed several thousands of them. 
Charles was driven out of Sicily, and the king of 
Aragon took possession of it. 

The Pope, who was firmly persuaded that all the 
kingdoms of the earth were his to give or take away 
as he pleased, now offered the crown of Aragon to 
Philip the Third of France if he would conquer it for 
himself, that being the usual condition on wiiich such 
things were granted. This prince, not having the 
sensitive conscience which had distinguished his father, 
eagerly consented, and led an army into Spain for the 
purpose. He might better have stayed at home; the 
terrible heat cut down his soldiers faster than the 
swords of their enemies could do, and he was more 
anxious to get back into his own country than he had 
been to leave it. It was hard to get provisions, or proper 



90 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

attendance for the sick, who died by hundreds on the 
way ; the Spaniards attacked them continually as they 
marched, and to crown all, the King fell sick, and before 
the miserable remains of his army could reach the 
capital, he himself was numbered with the dead. His 
ambition had proved his ruin. 

He was succeeded by his son, Philip the Fourth, 
called " The Fair," who was but seventeen years old 
at the time of his father's death. 




CHAPTER XL 

A, ■ 

PHILIP THE FAIR AND HIS SONS. M85 1428. 



HE surname of this king must have been 
derived entirely from a handsome face, for, 
according to the ungrammatical old proverb 
" Handsome is that handsome does," he did not deserve 
it on the score of good actions. He seems to have 
been thoroughly selfish and cold-hearted, greedy for 
money and unscrupulous in his ways of getting it. 
He introduced the practice of debasing the coin — that 
is, mixing inferior metals with gold and silver, — and 
then refused to take this money in payment of the debts 
due to himself. In our day no people would bear 
such treatment, except, perhaps, in a despotic country 
like Turkey ; but in the fourteenth century it was con- 
sidered the duty of subjects to endure whatever their 
kings chose to command. 



PHILIP THE FAIR AND HIS SONS. 91 

Kin«^s were not the only oppressors in those dark 
centuries. Every noble was possessed of almost abso- 
lute power over the unfortunate peasants who obtained 
a wretched living by tilling his land. We read of 
their being forced to perform unmanly and degrading 
antics for the amusement of the lords and their 
guests, and of their being kept up all night, after a 
hard day's work, to beat the surface of a pond near 
some fine lady's window, that her slumbers might not 
be disturbed by the croaking of the frogs ! A heavy 
reckoning were the masters heaping up for themselves, 
to be paid in the fullness of time. 

Philip the Fourth was certainly a man of energy 
and talent. His ingenuity in getting money has sel- 
dom been equalled. The parliament, or high court 
of justice, which under St. Louis had been the 
place where all men were sure of obtaining their 
rights, was considered by him only an instrument 
by which he could squeeze money out of his sub- 
jects. You must remember that in France the word 
parliament has never meant what it does in England 
— a body of men like our Congress, who meet to make 
laws for the people. It was more like our Supreme 
Court. The States-General, which in France took the 
place of a parliament or congress, was brought together 
for the first time in the reign of Philip the Fair, and 
was made up of three classes, the nobles, the clergy, 
and the common people, or, as they were afterwards 
called, the Third Estate. 

Though the King required so much money for his 
own purposes, he had no mind that his people should 
be extravagant. The less they spent on themselves, the 



92 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

more they would have for him; so he made very strict 
laws to regulate what they should eat, drink and wear. 
Nobody was to have more than one dish of meat at 
dinner and two at supper, and as people thought just 
as much good eating then as they do now, this was 
a great annoyance to them. They tried to get rid of 
it by putting several kinds of meat on the same dish, 
but the -king soon heard of it, and made anew law 
forbiddino; it. One mio;ht have thouo;ht be was a 
dressmaker, to read over the laws regulating the cloth- 
ing of his subjects. The quantity of trimming allowed 
on a dress was exactly stated, and depended on the 
rank of the wearer. To make a distinction between 
the nobles and common people, the latter were not 
allowed to keep a carriage or have a wax candle car- 
ried before them at night, and their wives were for- 
bidden to wear expensive furs, gold or jewels. It must 
have been hard for these rich people not to spend 
their own money as they pleased, but "■ the king wills 
it " was enough, and they never thought of grumbling 
— at least, not aloud. 

Long, pointed shoes were the fashion in this reign, 
but here, again, the khig had something to say. The 
plain man could not have his shoes more than twelve 
inches long ; this was called " the king's foot." A 
knight might extend them to eighteen inches, a baron 
to twenty-four, and a prince to thirty, or two feet and 
a half of our measure. Probably the king would have 
liked to have his about five feet lono- if it had not been 
for setting a good example to his subjects, which he 
was very anxious to do. How these good people man- 
aged to get along without tripping each other up, is 



PHILIP THE FAIR AND HIS SONS. 93 

not stated, but one soon becomes accustomed to the 
most inconvenient fashions, as we have seen in our 
own day. 

Philip was always trying to get what was not his own, 
and therefore always quarreling with somebody. His 
first attack was on Edward the First of England, whom 
he cheated out of the province of Guienne, one of the 
English possessions in France. Having patched up a 
peace with him, he next invaded the rich country of 
Flanders on his northeastern border, and soon declared it 
" annexed" to France. But the liberty-loving Flem- 
ings, after enduring for a short time the tyranny of an 
insolent French governor, were disposed to act over 
again the tragedy of the Sicilian Vespers. At the 
dead of night a sudden war-cry sounded in the silent 
city of Bruges ; chains were stretched across the 
streets to prevent the French from running about the 
town, as it was said ; but there was not much danger 
of their running, for they were pitched headlong from 
high windows to dash out their brains upon the stone 
pavements, or taken to the slaughter-houses to have 
their throats cut, — and before the dreadful carnival was 
at an end, a bloody grave was all that remained to 
those who had been feeding upon the fat of the land 
in conquered Flanders. 

To punish these audacious rebels, Philip sent an 
army into their country under the command of some 
of his bravest generals. At the battle of Courtray, 
which followed, the Flemings showed that it was not 
only in midnight massacres that they could make way 
with their foes. The French were hopelessly beaten ; 
their gilt spurs were picked up by the bushel, at least 



94 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

so the story runs, and hung up as trophies in the 
great church; and instead of a courier spurring gaily 
towards Paris with the news of a triumph, a jaded 
fugitive brought Phih'p a scrap of bloody parchment 
on which some wounded knio-ht had scrawled the 
tidings of defeat. 

At length peace was made with Flanders, but there 
was another quarrel to be fought out. The Pope of 
that day, Boniface the Eighth, a haughty and over- 
bearing man, had already ha'd some disputes with 
Philip as to the right of the latter to tax the clergy, 
the King taking the ground, that as this class were as 
much interested as any other in the good order and 
prosperity of the country, they ought therefore to help 
in supporting the government. This the Pope would 
not listen to, and sent out one bull after another against 
him, each more abusive than the last. As the King 
was not in the least affected by these bulls, and held 
fast to his own purpose, Pope Boniface excommuni- 
cated him and threatened to lay his kingdom under an 
interdict, which, in those times, was a great calamity 
for the people. By " Interdiction " all offices of the 
clergy w^ere forbidden, except the baptism of new-born 
infants; there could be no service in the churches, no 
burial of the dead with religious rites, x\o marriages; 
the King was declared deposed, and whoever should 
kill him was assured of the Pope's forgiveness. 

This state of things could not last forever, and some 
of Philip's friends in Italy who had their own private 
reasons for hating the Pope, forced their way into his 
palace at Anagni, and took him prisonor. It is even 
said that one of them brutally struck the white-haired 



PHILIP THE FAIR AND HIS SONS. 95 

old man in the lace with his iron gauntlet, so that the 
blood streamed down. Boniface was rescued after a 
few days by his friends, and taken to Rome, but he had 
received his death blow. He lost his reason, and after 
some weeks of sufferino- durino- which he imao;ined 
himself starving, he was found dead in his bed. 

After a short interval, Philip persuaded the Cardinals 
to choose a Pope of his own nomination, — a French- 
man who took the name of Clement the Fifth. He 
was the King's very obedient servant, and agreed 
beforehand to the most degrading conditions, as the 
price to be paid for his elevation. He established himsolf 
at Avio^non, in France, instead of at Rome, and for 
seventy years his successors. Frenchmen like himself, 
followed his example. When any thing too shameful 
was required of him by Philip, he would try to get 
off by pretending to be sick, but he never succeeded 
in shaking himself free of the king, who held on like 
a leech. Philip's principal use for him was to make 
him force money out of the people, and poor Clement 
traveled from place to place, exacting tithes for this, 
and tithes for that, until everybody hated the sight of 
him. He extorted money from the Jews until it was 
plain that they could yield no more, but this was not 
enough. The cry of Philip was still for "gold! gold!" 
and when all other sources had been drained dry, he 
revealed to the Pope a scheme he had long been 
revolving in his mind; it was the destruction of the 
Knights Templars. 

To understand what this means, you must go back to 
the time of the First Crusade. After Jerusalem ha<l 
been taken by the Christians in 1099, most of the 



96 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

crusading army returned to Europe, leaving those who 
stayed in Palestine in a rather unprotected position. 
For the defence and relief of these, two great socie- 
ties were established; one called the Knights of St. 
John, who took care of the sick and of strangers, and 
the other called the Knights of the Temple, who bound 
themselves to erect a temple at Jerusalem and main- 
tain it ao'ainst the infidels. They were both monks and 
knights ; that is, they were not allowed to marry, and 
were obliged to give up the riches and pleasures of 
life and promise obedience to their superiors ; but it 
was also their duty to fight fqr their cause, which monks 
could not do. 

In spite of their vow of poverty, these Knights of the 
Temple became, in the course of time, immensely 
rich, and when it was no longer the fashion to go on 
crusades, they grew luxurious and idle, as people are 
apt to do who have no steady occupation, and led very 
different lives from the pure ones they set out to lead. 
Many dreadful stories were told about them, which 
grew worse as they passed from mouth to mouth ; and 
as they had done nothing to make the people of their 
own time love them, there was no one"" to speak a word 
in their favor when Philip resolved on their ruin. 

He began by inviting the Grand Master of the 
Templars, Jacques de Molay, to come to France on busi- 
ness, pretending that he wanted to consult him 
about the plan of a new crusade, all the while meaning 
probably, to put him to a cruel death when the right 
time should come. Suddenly, by a well-arranged 
plan, every Templar in France was arrested and 
thrown into prison on the same day, and Philip at 



PHILIP THE FAIR AND HIS SONS. 97 

once took possession of the Temple and its hoards of 
wealth. 

So far all had succeeded, but it was still necessary 
to go through some form which should excuse such 
an action to the world, and a regular system of torture 
was applied to the unfortunate prisoners, under the 
agonies of which some of the poor wretches confessed 
impossible crimes, too loathsome to be repeated, and 
which they denied afterward when relieved from the 
torture. It made no difference what they confessed or 
denied ; judgment was pronounced against them, and 
on one day fifty-four of them were burnt at the stake. 
After years of persecution, the Pope finally ordered 
that the whole society of the Templars should be abol- 
ished and their possessions distributed in various ways, 
the King of France of course getting a large share. 

The Grand Master and two of the higher officers of 
the Order were still captives, and having under hor- 
rible tortures confessed what was charged against 
them, they were condemned to perpetual imprisonment. 
When the sentence was read to them their courao-e 
came back ; they denied everything, and said it was 
only their cruel sufferings that had made them say 
what was not true ; and without waiting for another 
trial, Philip had them privately burned at night. 
There was a tradition, long believed in France, that 
when the Grand Master was tied to the stake and the 
flames were making their way over his body and play- 
ing about his gray hair, he summoned the Pope and 
the King to meet him before the judgment seat of God, 
the one within forty days and the other within a year ; 
but this was probably a prophecy made after the event, 
7 



98 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

and suggested by the fact that both Pope and King 
died within the periods stated. 

Philip the Fair left three sons, Louis X., the Quar- 
reler, Phih'p v., the Long, and Charles lY., the Fair, 
all of whom became, in* succession, kings of France ; 
liis daughter, Isabella, married Edward II. of England. 
By a singular fatality none of his sons left any male 
children; and as an old law in France, called the Sa- 
lique law, forbade a woman to ascend the throne, the 
crown which had descended from father to son ever 
since the time of Hugh Capet, passed to Philip of 
Valois, a nephew of Philip the Fair. 

Little is known of the state of France during the 
reigns of the three Brother-Kings, except that there was 
great distress among the people. The barons were 
occupied in regaining the power which had been taken 
from them under the severe reign of Philip the Fourth, 
and the common people, trampled on by all, had no 
St. Louis to protect them. The miserable people 
called Lepers were accused of poisoning the wells, — 
a thing they could have had no possible object in doing, 
— and were burned alive by hundreds. Then the pop- 
ular fury broke out against the Jews, who w^ere said 
to have conspired with the lepers, and they were often 
condemned without even the mockery of a trial. At 
one place a pit was dug in the ground, a great fire was 
lighted in the bottom of it, and a hundred and sixty 
Jews, men and women together, were pitched in alive 
and burned to death. Some of them were so much 
excited by the horrible festival that they jumped in 
of their own accord, " singing like wedding-guests," 
the chronicler says. These were the poor; the richer 



PRILIP OF V ALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD. 99 

ones were kept in prison until the King could get pos- 
session of their property, after which they were in 
many cases banished from the kingdom. 

But it is time to turn from these sickening scenes to 
the royal but unlucky family of Valois. 



CSAPTEB XII, 

PHILIP OF VALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD 1328-1364. 




HILIP the Sixth was a King that suited the 
great nobles exactly. In the reign of Philip 
\ the Fair they had been kept in subjection, 
and during the short lives of his sons they had been 
gradually getting their own way more and more, but 
here was some one who began his reign in a truly 
kingl}'- fashion, according to their notion. Nothing 
was heard of but feasting, tournaments, shows and 
revels of all kinds. Plenty of money, plenty of fine 
clothes, new furniture and equipments, crowds of ser- 
vants and officers, lavish hospitality — all these things 
made the court of France the must attractive place in 
Europe. 

It was not his own nobles alone that King Philip 
mvited to these entertainments. We are told that 
several Kings preferred Paris to their own dull capitals, 
and stayed there altogether, each with a brilliant com- 
pany of knights and ladies who were all kept sumptu- 
ously at Philip's expense. Or was it at his expense? 



100 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

The toiling peasants of France and the industrious 
middle class could have told a different story. One 
proof of the King's boundless generosity to his nobles 
is that he excused them from paying the debts due 
by them to these people! 

Early in this reign began the great struggle between 
Eno-land and France which is known as the Hundred 
Years' War. Edward the Third of England, who was 
son of Philip's cousin Isabella, daughter of Philip the 
Fair, pretended that this relationship gave him a claim 
to the crown of France. He was too clear-headed a 
man not to know that his claim was utterly groundless, 
for there was a o-randson of Louis the Tenth who had 
a much better right; but a small excuse serves in such 
cases, and Edward dispatched a fleet of ships to Flan- 
ders, on the northeastern coast of France, where a 
battle was fought near Sluys, which almost destroyed 
Philip's navy. ^ 

This defeat was so entirely unexpected that no one 
dared to tell Philip of it until the court fool contrived 
to bring it in by way of a joke. " What cowards those 
English are!" he exclaimed. "Why so?" inquired 
the King. " Because they did'nt dare to jump into 
the sea as oar brave fellows have done !" One sees 
by this that the wit of a court-jester was not required 
to be of a very high order. 

There was some rather unsatisfactory skirmishing on 
land after this, but nothing o1" importance was done 
until a war in Brittany between two rival counts gave , 
Edward a chance to strike another blow. He and J 
Philip took opposite sides as a matter of course, the 
latter defending the party of the Count of Elois, and 

' ' I 

: •._.......... .......: J 



PHILIP OF VALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD. 101 

Edward helping the heroic Countess of Montfort, 
whose huslDand was a prisoner in Philip's hands. 

This countess had, as old Froissart tells us, "the cour- 
age of a man and the heart of a lion." Beinoc driven 
from place to place by the King's troops, she finally 
took refuge in Hennebon, a town on the coast, and 
there defended herself bravely with such an army as 
she had been able to get together. She wrote to 
Edward that she would hold out until help came 
from him, and she kept her word, in spite of 
great discontent among her own soldiers, who thought 
she was throwing away their lives in the long siege. 
At last the welcome relief came ; a fleet of English 
vessels commanded by the brave Sir Walter Manny, 
who had already done good service at Sluys, sailed 
into the harbor, and the besiegers moved off. Frois- 
sart says: "He who then saw the Countess come 
down from the castle in great gladness and kiss Sir 
Walter and the lords that were with him, one after 
another, two or three times, may well say she was a 
noble and valiant dame." 

The year 1346 saw the first of those great English 
victories in France which the national pride loves so 
dearly to dwell on — the battle of Crecy. You have 
read in English history how the Black Prince, then 
only sixteen years old, sent to his father for help, being 
hard pressed; how the King asked if he was wounded 
or struck down, and being told that he was not, ans- 
wered, " Let the boy win his spurs! " and refused to help 
him at all ; how the old blind King of Bohemia, whose 
son had prudently run away from the battle, begged 
two knights to lead his horse forward into the enemy's 



102 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

ranks where he could give one spear-thrust; how they 
tied their horses to his, one on each side, rushed for- 
ward into the battle, and were found all three dead 
together; how the Black Prince adopted the motto 
" Ich dien " (I serve), of the blind King, and the three 
ostrich feathers that his armor was marked with, as his 
own — all this you know by heart. 

All day long the battle lasted. The French knights 
fought fiercely, but the English archers made dreadful 
havoc with their horses, and when a warrior was un- 
horsed, his heavy armor would not let him rise again; 
then Edward's Welsh soldiers rushed upon the French 
with their long knives, which they drove through the 
joints of the armor, slaughtering them like cattle. 
Philip, whose best quality seems to have been per- 
sonal courage, could not be persuaded to quit the field. 
At last one of his knisrhts seized the bridle of his 
horse and led him away without asking leave. Only 
five knights of the vast host that had started out that 
morning flushed with pride and hope, remained with 
the Kins: in his dismal flio-ht. The rest were scattered 
hither and thither, flying for their lives, and telling 
the sad tale as they passed along, seeking only a 
place where they could fling themselves down in safety. 
The heavy-hearted Philip rode through the darkness 
to the nearest castle, where he found the drawbridge 
up and the gates shut for the night. "Who knocks 
at such an hour?" shouted the warden in answer to 
the King's summons. "Open, Castellan," answered 
Philip; "itis the fortune of France." The English 
found on counting the dead that they had killed two 
kings, eleven princes, twelve hundred knights, and 



PHILIP OF VALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD.' 108 

thirty thousand common soldiers, a number almost 
equal to the whole force of the English. 

It has been said that cannon were first used at the 
battle of Crecy, but if so, they did little good or harm, 
being about as much like the destructive engines 
which mow down thousands in> a modern battle as a 
wheelbarrow is like a locomotive. They were exceed- 
ingly clumsy and difficult to handle, and so slightly 
made that they often burst in firing, killing those who 
stood by them instead of the enemy. Even when they 
went off successfullv, the round stones which served 
instead of metal balls were buried in the earth -or 
rolled harmlessly away in the wrong direction. They 
did more good in sieges, where they began to be used 
about the same time. 

It seems as if the reign of Philip of Yalois consisted 
mostly in the doings of Edward the Third, for no sooner 
have we done with Edward at Crecy than we must 
follow him to Calais, which he besieged for nearly a 
year. Its fortifications were so strong that he did not 
try to take them by storm, but preferred to starve out 
the garrison, his ships in the meantime preventing any 
food from reaching them by sea. Philip came in sight 
of them with his army more than once, causing wild 
joy among the famishing citizens, who hoped that their 
King would force his way through the English army 
and bring them relief. But no; Philip thought the 
English looked too strong for him, and, without stri- 
king a blow, abandoned the city to its fate. 

At last the hour came when everv rat and dead dojr 
had been eaten, when hardly even the bones of a horse 
were left, and when every old boot and shoe had long 



104 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

since been chewed up for food; and the brave people 
of Calais were forced to surrender. The story of the 
six men who gave themselves up as hostages for the 
rest, coming with halters round their necks before the 
indignant King, and being saved from death only by 
the intercession of Queen Philippa, belongs properly 
to English history. It will always be a pleasant thing 
to think of; a bright spot in the midst of a dark and 
dreary picture. 

While Philip the Sixth was wasting his time in get- 
ting together armies which he did not ase, his subjects 
were grroanina- under taxes that m ide them reoret even 
the days of Philip the Fair: The one on salt, which 
afterwards came to be distino-aished from all others 
by being called the Gabelle, was cruelly hard on the 
poor ; bat even this would have been borne without 
open murmurs if it had not been for one of the most 
shameful impositions a King can practise — the debasing 
of the coin. Philip did this until his people nearly went 
mad with distress, the value of money changing so 
continually that no one could ever be certain of its 
value. It all seemed to be a matter of chance. As a 
natural consequence business came almost to a stand- 
still, and, as is said, grass grew in the streets of Paris, 
In the country it was still worse; wherever the Eng- 
lish army had passed, the land looked as if it had been 
eaten off by grasshoppers. The Italian poet Petrarch, 
who visited France about this time, has left a moving 
picture of the desolation that met his eye everywhere. 

The year after the taking of Calais a terrible pesti- 
lence called the Black Death broke out in many parts 
of Europe and spread through France;— poor France, 



PHILIP OF VALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD. 105 



already dragged down to almost the lowest depth of 
misery, her fair fields trampled over by the English, 
her King a heartless tyrant, many of her best and 
bravest sons already sacrificed on the battle-field, — in 
the midst of all this came the plague, which had at 
least one good effect; it put a stop to war while it 
lasted. But alas! the old outcry was raised; it was 
owing to the Jews, who had poisoned the waters! And 
without more inquiry, thousands of these poor wretches, 
who seem to be the first mark aimed at in every season 
of distress, were cast into the flames. 

Some people took a way of their own of putting a 
stop to the pestilence, which, they had no doubt, was 
God's judgment on a guilty nation. They thought 
they might please him by tormenting themselves, and 
great numbers of them wandered about the country 
half-naked, armed with whips of which the lashes were 
tipped with steel, and scourging their bare shoulders 
till the blood ran down in streams. These were called 
FlageUants^ and were after a while put down by the 
strong hand, the Pope disapproving of their excesses. 
But all this did not stop the pestilence, which included 
high as well as low among its victims. 

When the disease had somewhat spent its strength 
and people were beginning to think about the business 
of life again, Philip, whose wife had died of the plague, 
married a second time, of course burdening his people 
with new taxes to pay for the wedding festivities ; but 
almost before these were well over, he died. It would 
be pleasant if we could imagine him with his last 
breath advising his son to make himself beloved by his 
subjects, to lighten their taxes, to rule with justice and 



106 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

mercy ; but the only instructions recorded, are those 
urging hi in to make good his claim to the throne 
against all opposition. 

The title of " John the Good " by which this son was 
called was a singularly inappropriate one, unless we 
remember that it meant nothing more than what is 
expressed by the term " a good fellow " — which in this 
case meant a thoughtless, extravagant person, popuiar 
with gay companions, ready to spend other people's 
money, and sure never to let their rights stand for a 
moment in the way of his own selfish pleasure. His 
first idea on finding himself a king was to make a jour- 
ney through his country and set everything straight. 
He knew that things were going very badly, but wasn't 
he a king, and wouldn't the very sight of him be good 
for the straining eyes, blinded with tears and looking 
anxiously for some sign of better things to come? So 
he went about holding tournaments (which the people 
had to pay for), and created a new order of knight- 
hood — the Order of the Star — in imitation of Edward 
the Third's famous Order of the Garter. 

But this did not put bread into his people's mouths, 
or help them to pay their taxes, though it made the king 
very happy. He had read too many foolish romances 
in his youth, and his head was full of nonsense ; so 
as long as he could have his Feasts of the Peacock, 
and be surrounded by a gay crowd of ladies and gen- 
tlemen who flattered and admired him, he felt that he 
was fully as great a man as Charlemagne. 

All this time, Edward of England and his son, the 
Black Prince, were roaming about in France, doing all 
the harm they could, taking towns everywhere, and 



PHILIP OF V ALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD. 107 

making themselves masters of large districts of coun- 
try. King John began to be very tired of this kind 
of work, and thought it was high time to give the Eng- 
lish a lesson. He marched southward until he met the 
Black Prince near Poitiers, (the old battle-field of Clo- 
vis and Charles Martel), with a very little army, 
scarcely one-tenth the size of his own. But the Prince 
had chosen his ground just where it would place the 
enemy at the greatest disadvantage for attacking him; 
the French fell into confusion, and before the end of 
the day they were flying in all directions. 

John's three older sons, with eight hundred knights 
who had not drawn sword that day, ran away like the 
rest, — by the king's order, it was said, but probably 
if they had been very brave they would have diso- 
beyed their father just for once, — while the fourteen- 
year-old Philip, his youngest son, stayed with his 
father to the end, crying out, "Father, look to the 
left ! Father, look to the right ! " while the enemies 
were pressing him on every side. At last both were 
taken captive and sent to England, where they were 
very kindly treated. 

It is at this time that the name Dauphin first appears 
in French history. In the last year of Philip the 
Sixth's reign, the prince of Dauphiny, a country 
bordering on Burgundy, grew so tired of life that he 
wanted to turn monk and forget all about the world 
and its troubles. Having no son, he offered his coun- 
try to PhilijD's grandson on condition that it should 
never be annexed to France, but should remain inde- 
pendent. Philip accepted the gift, and to fulfill the 
letter of the agreement, it was arranged that as soon 



108 HISTOBY OF FRANCE, 

as a prince became King of France he should cease to 
be Dauphin, some other person taking that title. If 
Dauphiny could never belong to the King of France, 
it could always belong to his eldest son. 

The Dauphin Charles, who took matters into his own 
hands after the battle of Poitiers, was a youth of nine- 
teen, insignificant in appearance and weak in health. 
He assembled the States General, and they, beginning 
slowly to take in the idea that the people had rights, 
firmly refused to grant the mone}'- demanded for 
the king's ransom until certain abuses were remedied. 
No more tampering with the coin, said they ; no more 
seizing of private property for the royal service with- 
out paying for it; no more taking of the public money 
by the Dauphin for his own use. Charles agreed to 
every thing; it was all quite reasonable, he said; so he 
sent a courier with a copy of the agreement for his 
father to sign. But at the same time he dispatched a 
private letter telling the king to refuse, which John 
did accordingly. When the people at home under- 
stood the game that had been played, they rose against 
the Dauphin and made him again promise all that they 
demanded, o-oino- so far as to murder two of his coun- 
sellors before his face. " Save me, save me !" he cried 
out to the leader of the insurgents when this horrid 
deed was done, and if this man had not instantly taken 
his own red cap, the sign of revolution, oif his head 
and clapped it on the Dauphin's, Charles might never 
have lived to be called the Wise. 

While these things were going on in Paris, the con- 
dition of the peasants became so intolerable that they 
broke out into a fearful insurrection called the Jacquerie. 



PHILIP OF V ALOIS. JOHN THE GOOD. 109 

Their only idea was that the rich had injured them, and 
it was on the rich they must be revenged. They seized 
k)r(-ls and ladies and their children wherever they could 
find thera, murdered them brutally or tortured them to 
let them know how it felt, set fire to their castles, and 
fairly reveled in blood and pillage. 

To understand their feelings, one needs only to read 
a little of the history of those times. In the language 
of a French writer, "there was but one victim on 
whom the ills of war fell, and that was the peasant. 
Before the war he had been exhausted to pay for all 
those fine arms and those rich banners that had let 
themselves be taken at Crecy and Poitiers. And 
after the war, who paid the ransom ? The peasant again. 
The noble prisoners, released on parole, returned to their 
lands to scrape together, in haste, the monstrous sums 
they had promised without higgling on the field of bat- 
tle. The peasant's property took no long time to count ; 
lean cattle, rotting harness, a plough, a cart and a few 
old farming implements. He had no furniture, nor 
anything laid by except a little seed. This being seized 
and sold, what remained to be taken ? His body ; the 
poor fellow's skin. Something perhaps might still be 
got out of him; perhaps he had some hiding-place where 
he kept his money, so they scorched his feet. Neither 
fire nor iron was spared." 

Who can wonder at his cruelty when his enemies 
were helpless before him in their turn? It was not so 
much the hope of gain as a wild desire for revenge 
that took possession of these poor wretches. It was a 
satisfaction to think that they could " take it out " of 
the nobles in some way. But their triumph did not 



110 HISTOBY OF FBAXCE. 

last lono*. AYhen the enraged nobiiitv waked up from 
the shock enough to know what was going- on, they 
banded together and hunted down the peasants like 
wild boasts; and after a feAV weeks a death-like silence 
reigned again in the homes of the poor. 

About this time news came that thekino^ of France, 
weary of English hospitality, had signed a disgraceful 
treaty by which he agreed to give up half his king- 
dom to Edward; but the dauphin, who had more spirit 
than his father, and, besides, was not in prison, refused 
to be bound by this agreement, and King John had to 
go back again. At length such terms were proposed 
as both sides could agree to, and he was finally released, 
leaving his second son as a hostage. " The king of 
England was a hard nut to crack," says plain old Frois- 
sart. 

All the time of King John's stay in EngLind there 
had been a wax taper burning in Paris as a sort of per- 
petual prayer for his safety. It was said to be six miles 
long, and was kept on a roller and unwound as fast as 
it burnt out. The Kino- and his sons had a merry meet- 
ing at Calais, where he "received them sweetly and 
handsomely, for well he knew how." It was a pity that 
he didn't know anything else but how to behave with 
the outward appearance of a gentleman. At first he 
and his son made some reforms, and seemed as if they 
meant to try to govern better ; but the king soon fell 
into his old way of going about the country feasting and 
holding tournaments, thinking that if he only spent 
money enough it would all come right somehow or 
other. In the mean time the money was not collected 
for his ransom ; and when he heard that his son Louis, 



CHARLES TEE WISE. 



Ill 



^Yhom he had left on parole, had broken his word and 
escaped, he went back himself, saying that " good faith, 
if it were banished from the rest of the world, ought to 
be found ini the heart of kings." So he returned to 
England, where he was received with bonfires and bell- 
ringing, lodged in a splendid palace, and supplied with 
the means of enjoying himself in his favorite way. He 
lived only a few months after his return, and his royal 
jailer gave him a splendid funeral at St. PauFs. 



CHAPTER XIIL 



CHARLES THE WISE. 1364-1380. 

OBODY expected much from the dauphin. 
His long, pale face and thin figure were not 
l!'^^*-^] very promising, and his health, never good, was 
almost ruined by a dose of poison administered by his 
dear cousin, Charles the Bad, in revenge for his own 
imprisonment. But though he spent most of his time 
sitting at a study-table, he knew how to direct the 
movements of armies, and, still better, how to select 
able men to command them. Edward the Third said 
of him, that he was the one of all his enemies whom 
he never saw, and yet who gave him the most trouble. 
Charles soon found enouMi to do. There was a war 
raging in Spain between Pedro the Cruel and his 
brother Henry, and the latter having asked Charles for 
help, our wise king thought it would be a good thing 
to occupy the idle soldiers called "Free Lances" in 



112 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

something besides plundering their own countrymen. 
These men had served in both the English and French 
armies, and, having been disbanded, formed themselves 
into " Free Companies," which meant free to do as they 
pleased and live on other people's earnings. They 
besieged towns, castles and churches, obliging their 
defenders to pay a heavy ransom to get rid of these 
unwelcome visitors, and quartered themselves upon 
the farmers without ceremony. Charles's great gen- 
eral, Du Guesclin, undertook to get an army from 
among these troublesome spirits, and fight Prince 
Henry's battles for him. Pedro the Cruel naturally 
looked to Edward the Black Prince as his friend be- 
cause they were both enemies of the French, and being 
driven out of Spain, took refuge at Bordeaux, where 
Edward had a regular court and was a king in his way, 
just as much as Charles was at Paris. 

As the years went on, the Black Prince gradually 
lost ground in France. His health failed, the people 
whom he had conquered rebelled against the enormous 
taxes levied on them to support his war with Spain, 
and at last he went home to die. 

Du Guesclin in the meantime had been going on 
steadily in the work of re-conquering France. The 
last place he besieged was very stubborn in its resist- 
ance, and kept him a long time waiting at its gates. 
At last the governor promised that he would surrender 
if help did not come from England before a certain 
day. The day came, the promised relief did not; but 
news was brought to the governor that Du Guesclin 
had died of a fever. True to his word, the command- 
er of the fortress, having sworn to surrender to none 



CHARLES THE WISE. 113 



but the Constable, hauled down his flag, and marching 
out at the head of his men, laid the keys of the castle 
in silence on the dead man's breast. 

For some time after his death there was no one will- 
ing to take the office of Constable, but at last the king 
bestowed it on Oliver De Clisson, who received the 
nickname of " The Butcher." On one occasion, when 
a garrison had irritated him by an unusually long re- 
sistance, and were at last compelled by starvation to 
surrender, he stood at the gate as the famishing 
wretches- tottered out, worn to the bone by hunger 
and misery, and dashed out the brains of each in suc- 
cession with a heavy battle-axe. When he had dis- 
posed of fifteen of them in this way, he threw down 
the axe with a sigh of relief, and left the rest for some 
one else to finish off. We must admit that he justified 
his name. 

Charles the AVise lived only two months after the 
death of the brave Du Guesclin. The people of France, 
who despised him at first for his weakness, had found 
out how much better it was to have a wise king who 
could sit at home and let his generals do the fighting, 
than a foolish one who led his armies to defeat by his 
rashness. Here was a king who had neither debased 
the coin nor increased the taxes; who had driven the 
English almost entirely out of his country, and had 
added several provinces to it by his wisdom; who paid 
his soldiers their wages regularly, and kept up a wise 
economy in his own expenses. No more feasting now 
at the palace, no more tournaments; and yet, when 
the occasion called for it, Charles could entertain for- 
eign embassadors at his court with a splendor greater 
8 



114 IIISTOEY OF FBANCE. 

than had ever been seen before. As there Avere no 
grasping favorites to be pensioned out of the people's 
money, the king grew rich and the people felt none 
the poorer. 

It was said of Edward the Third of England, that 
his victories made his people "very proud and very 
poor." It might have been said of Philip of Valois 
and his son John that their wars left their people very 
poor and not very proud; but regarding Charles the 
Fifth we can truly say that while the}^ had reason to be 
proud, they did not at the same time feel that their 
pride had been fed at the expense of their prosperity. 

Though tlie people of France had been growing 
more refined ever since the time of Charlemagne, there 
was still room for improvement, as you will think 
wdien 3'ou read some of the directions given by a noble- 
man to his daup'hters forthe reaailation of their con- 
duct. They must not laugh loudly at the table, nor 
get their fingers daubed with their food; they must 
keep themselves clean and their nails cut short, and 
when they walk in the streets they are not to stop and 
look in at the windows of dwelling houses. Lastly, he 
recommends them to refrain from stealing and telling 
lies, which we hope they did after reading his fatherly 
advice. 

As we have often spoken of tournaments, some words 
of explanation in regard to chivalry, the institution in 
which they originated, will not be out of place. Chiv- 
alry began in very dark times when might made right 
and the weak were oppressed by the strong, and was 
at first only an association of the best and bravest men 
to correct this cruel state of thino-s. It was a beauti- 



CHARLES THE WISE. 115 

fill idea, and when fully carried out, must have come 
as near to the standard of perfect manhood as is possi- 
ble in this world. 

At seven years old, the boy designed for knighthood 
must leave his home and be sent to the castle of some 
knight renowned for bravery, which was not hard to 
find, for in those days all knights were called brave and 
all ladies fair. Here he passed the years from seven 
to fourteen, during which time he was called a page, 
and pursued the studies which would fit him to do honor 
to the knightly profession. Not reading, writing and 
arithmetic — oh, no ! Many great men had to make 
a prick in the paper with sword or dagger if it were 
necessary to sign a deed, and reading was thought fit 
only for monks. But the page must learn to take care 
of horses and armor, manage his lady's falcon, follow 
the dogs to the chase, and practice the two great vir- 
tues of truthfulness and obedience. 

At fourteen the page becomes a squire. His ardor 
has long been fired at the recital of noble deeds, of 
which he has heard during the winter evenings w^hen 
the family are gathered in the great hall, at one end of 
which is a blazins: fire, showino* the suits of armor and 
trophies of the chase,which hang upon the wall. Often 
the wandering troubadour or minstrel claims a place 
by the fireside, and when he has been warmed and fed, 
sings a song of warlike deeds which makes the young 
squire burn with impatience to enter on his career. 
The boy's education now becomes stricter. He must 
begin the labors and the self-denial which are to fit 
him to play his part in the world. When he is old 
enough he follows his lord to battle, and is bitterly 



116 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

disappointed if no opportunity occurs of distinguish- 
ing himself, and earning the gilded spurs which are to 
replace his iron ones. At the age of twenty-one he 
is admitted into the full companionship of knighthood, 
unless it has been his good fortune to earn the priv- 
ilege sooner. 

As knio-hts could not be fio-htinQ^ all the time, and 
from their restless, warlike life were apt to find the 
intervals of peace rather dull, they had mock fights, 
called tournaments. A great space was railed in, 
called the lists; outside of this were raised galleries 
crowded with spectators, numbers of splendidly dressed 
ladies adding brilliancy to the scene. At the sound 
of the trumpets, the knights, on horseback, started 
from opposite ends of the lists, and rode at full speed 
towards one another, each trying to unseat his oppo- 
nent by striking him with the end of his lance, which 
had been blunted for the occasion. Sometimes this 
riding back and forth would go on for hours, no one 
doing damage enough to bring the sport to an end — 
the ladies meanwhile cheerino; their favorites and send- 
ing them scarfs, ribbons and gloves, which the knights 
fastened on over their armor, feeling very proud of the 
compliment. Finally, the one who was decided to 
have done the best came and knelt down at the feet 
of the most beautiful lady, to receive the prize award- 
ed to the victor, amidst shouting and rejoicing from 
the vast crowd, and congratulations of friends. This 
sport was too exciting not to be very agreeable to such 
restless mortals as the warriors of the middle acres, and 
tournaments continued in fashion long after the inven- 
tion of gunpowder had closed the era of knighthood. 



CHARLES TEE WISE. 117 

And now we must pass on to the sad story of the 
son and successor of Charles the Wise. Poor little 
Charles the Sixth ! Left an orphan at twelve years 
old, handsome, light-hearted and rather empty-headed, 
the responsibilities of his kingdom weighed but little 
upon him, while his uncles encouraged him in all kinds 
of foolish amusements that would take his mind off 
from public affairs, and leave everything in their 
hands. 

There was not one of them who had anything like 
an unselfish desire for the good of the country, or the 
welfare of the kinjr. What each one wanted was to 
get the largest share of riches and power for himself, 
and, being responsible to no one, their avarice brought 
untold miseries upon the people of France. 

The oppression became so intolerable that in several 
places the populace rose against these hard masters, and 
demanded a removal of the outrao-eous taxes which 
were making the royal dukes rich at their expense. 
The dukes promised everything that was asked; and 
then, as soon as the rioters had been pacified by fair 
words, all engagements with them were broken, and 
the most terrible veno-eance taken for the rebellion. 
Public executions followed each other until the spec- 
tators began to protest against any more repetitions 
of the wretched spectacle, after which the victims 
jvere sewed up in sacks, and thrown by night into the 
Seine. 

At this time the people of Flanders, headed by a 
patriot named Van Artevelde, were in rebellion against 
their count, and the King's uncle, the Duko of Bur- 
gundy, taking up the quarrel, used the army of France 



118 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to inarch against them. He took the young king with 
him, and, after a terrible battle at Rosbecque, in which 
the Flemings were defeated and Van Artevelde killed, 
Charles was taken to the battle-field to gaze upon the 
hideous spectacle of a uiass of dead and and dying men, 
and told that it was he who had won the victory. This 
may have been the first of those fearful impressions 
upon his mind which colored his whole life and after- 
wards deepened into madness. Indeed, he gave a 
proof before long of the unsettling effect of excite- 
ment on a young and unbalanced mind. In going- 
through the town of Courtrai, where the French had 
been beaten in the time of Philip the Fair, somebody 
unluckily reminded him of the gilt spurs picked 
up after the battle and hung in the great church. 
This boy of fourteen instantly ordered that the town 
should be sacked and burned. 

If you can picture to yourself what these words 
mean — if you can imagine a brutal mob of soldiers 
rushing through the streets of a city howling like 
demons, setting fire to the houses, dashing out the 
brains of little children, treating women with every 
kind of outrage, stealing everything that can be carried 
off and destroying the rest, and only leaving the town 
when it is a heap of smoking ruins, from which tremb- 
lino' wretches are flying in every direction — then you 
will have an idea of what Charles the Sixth com- 
manded should be the fate of this large cit}^, on account 
of some trophies of a battle fought nearly a hundred 
years before. 

When the royal party returned to Paris, flushed 
with victory, the old work of punishment went on 



CHARLES THE WISE. 119 

ao-ain. There was more cuttino* off of heads and sew- 
ing up in sacks; some of the most distinguished men 
in the kino-dom, who had tried their best to restrain 
the people, were sacrificed; the taxes were laid on 
more heavily than ever, and the people, were obliged 
to pay an enormous fine to the king as the price of 
being let alone. 

To show his utter contempt for the city, Charles had 
the gates, which had at one time been shut against 
him, taken oft' their hinges and laid flat in the streets 
so that the whole procession should pass over them, 
this being understood as a symbol of the king's tramp- 
ling upon the pride of the Parisians. He also formally 
took away their privilege of stretching chains across 
the streets to keep out unwelcome visitors, which 
they had always looked upon as one of their few 
" rights." A wild plan for invading England, with 
preparations so enormous that they are only equalled 
in modern history by the Spanish Armada, resulted in 
a failure so ridiculous to all but the wretched people 
who had to bear the expense of it (and who were, of 
course, the poor), that but for this sad feature we 
might laugh at it as a very ill-played comedy. This, 
and the vouno; kind's ill-fated marriao-e to Isabella of 
Bavaria, are the principal events in that dark history 
until Charles, being twenty-one years old, took the 
government into his own hands, and tried, by surround- 
ing himself with the wisest counsellors he could find, 
to fulfill in some sort the duties of a king. 



120 HISTOEY OF FJRANCE. 

C JET AFTER XIV. 

CHAKLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 1380-1432. 




^ELDO^r in human history has a darker page 
been turned than that which records the woes 
of unhappy France during the fifty years that 
followed the death of Charles the Wise. A French 
writer, who lived two hundred years later, calls the 
reio-n of Charles the Sixth " the p-rave of a:ood law and 
good morals." The great had grown so wicked as to 
be without shame, and the low liad no restraint but 
fear. Robbery was the order of the day; from the 
noble with his cruel taxes to the highway inan who made 
pillage a trade, there was no other law than the law of 
the strongest. Poor Charles, with his kindly, pleasure- 
loving nature and wretched education, was not the 
man to bring order out of this chaos, though he made 
some praiseworthy efforts. 

The brave De Clisson having been brutally attacked 
in the street and left for dead, by a cowardly enemy 
who did not dare to meet him openly, the king set out 
to pursue the would-be murderer into Brittany, where 
he had taken refuge. On the way Charles was detained 
for some time by illness, and when still too weak to 
travel, persisted in renewing his journey. 

It was a sultry day in August. His way lay through 
what was called a forest, but its scant foliage gave him 
little protection from the scorching sun. From some 
strange whim he wore a heavy black velvet jacket, and 
a thick scarlet cap on his head. In order not to incom- 



CHARLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 121 



mode him with tho dust, his uncles and the other lords 
rode at some little distance, no one being near him but 
two pages. Saddenly a tall, wild-looking man, with 
nothing on l^ut a white shirt, sprang out upon him and 
seized his bridle, shouting, " Go no farther, King ! 
you are betrayed !" The men-at-arms hurried for- 
ward, and striking the man's hands with the butts of 
their lances, made him let go the bridle. As he seemed 
only a poor maniac, they did not drive him away, but 
let him follow the king for nearly half an hour, repeat- 
ing the same wild cry. 

After passino: throu2:h the forest thev came to a 
sandy plain, where the rays of the sun beat down di- 
rectly upon their heads. One of the pages who was 
riding with the king became drowsy from the dreadful 
heat, and being nearly asleep, let his lance fall against 
the steel helmet borne by his companion. The crash 
startled the king, who seemed to think that the mad- 
man's warning had been fulfilled, and began to strike 
furiously about him, wounding, and, as some reports 
say, killing several men before they could get out of 
his way. Ho rode about like a madman, striking 
blindly at whatever he saw; and it was not until his 
fury had somewhat spent itself and his strength began 
to fail, that one of his officers ventured to go up be- 
hind him and throw his arms around his body. He 
was lifted from his horse and laid gentl}^ on the ground; 
his eyes rolled about wildly, and he recognized no one. 
" We must go back," said his uncles; " here is an end 
of the trip to Brittany." On their way they met an 
ox-cart with some hay in it; they bound the king's 
arms, fearing that the frenzy might come on again, 



122 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

then laid liim in the cart, and the procession took its 
way to the town of Le Mans. 

I think there are few sadder pictures in history than 
that of this young man of twenty-four, whom his father 
had left a happy, healthy boy only twelve years before, 
stricken down in the bloom of his youth with a mad- 
ness for which there was to be no cure, surrounded by 
false friends, and without one true heart to turn to in 
his distress. The prudent and conscientious men with 
whom he had surrounded himself were instantlj^ ban- 
ished or put in prison, and the populace flocked daily 
to the Place de Grhve (place of public executions), 
hoping to see them hanged. De Olisson was forced to 
pay an immense fine, under pretence of his having 
been dishonest in office, and was deprived of his office 
of constable, and sent into Biittany. 

After a time the king recovered from this attack of 
insanity, but his mind was more feeble than before, 
and he could do little more than submit to whatever 
his uncles chose to do. The year after the dreadful 
iournev the kino- felt enouo-h better to desire to take 
part once more in one of the entertainments he had 
once been so fond of. One of the courtiers thought he 
would get up something more wild and extravagant 
than usual, and invented a kind of masked ball, at 
which the kino- and five of his knio-hts were to dis- 
guise themselves as satyrs. They were dressed in 
tight-fitting suits of coarse linen, which were first 
smeared with pitch and then covered all over with tow, 
to look like hair. The ball-room was lighted by pine 
torches, held up by the attendants, which threw a fiery 
glare over the scene. 



CHARLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 123 

The Duke of Orleans, the king's brother, seized one 
of these torches and held it close to the face of a satyr, 
to try whether he could recognize him. Whether 
he wa,s excited by wine and touched the torch to the 
the tow out of mischief, or whether what followed was 
the result of an accident, was never known. The tow 
and pitch instantly caught fire, and the flame spread 
from one to the other until all, except Charles, who 
happened to be at a little distance, were in a blaze. 
" Save the king ! " shouted one of the poor wretches 
in the midst of his torment ; but no one knew which 
was the king. His aunt, the Duchess of Berri, recog- 
nizeei him, however, and throwing her mantle over him, 
hurried him out of the roon;i. 

It was a horrible sio-ht to see these " livino; flames " 
run howlinn; about the dancinjr-hall ; the fire eatino- 
into their flesh, and their friends vainly trying to tear 
off the linen clothes which had been sewed tightly 
round their bodies. One saved himself by jumping 
into a tub of water which stood near ; the others lin- 
gered for three davs in dreadful sufi'erino' and then 
died. The inventor of the sport was among those who 
were burned, to the great delight of the poor people, 
to whom he had been very cruel. For his own amuse- 
ment and that of others, he had been accustomed 
to beat them like dogs until they barked, and to 
prick them with his spurs to make them cry out. 
When his body was carried through the streets at his 
funeral, some of them shouted out his own words : 
" Bark, dog, bark! " 

This fearful shock brought on a return of the king's 
disease. He became frantic, recognized no one, and 



124 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

had an especial horror of Queen Isabella, whom he 
declared he never had known. The only person who 
had any influence over him was his sister-in-law, Val- 
entina, Dutchess of Orleans. She, neglected by her 
husband, who spent his time with Queen Isabella in 
court gayeties, felt the more sympathy for the king, 
because she herself was unhappy, and she was very 
kind to him. He called her " My sweet sister," and 
was always satisfied when she was with him. 

And so fell that dark shadow which for thirty years 
rested on the hapless king. For awhile some efforts 
were made to cure him, and when these failed he was 
neglected and almost forgotten. For months together, 
it is said, his clothes were not changed, and he roamed 
about the vacant corridors of the Hotel St. Pol, a mel- 
ancholy shadow of greatness. The infamous queen 
cared no more for her children than for her husband; 
and once when, during a short interval of reason, the 
governess of the young princes and princesses came to 
the king and told him that they were in want of the 
necessaries of life, he burst into tears, and exclaimed, 
"Ah ! I can easily believe it, for Isabel treats myself 
no better." He then gave her the gold drinking-cup 
which he had just been using, that she might sell it and 
supply their wants. 

The people of Paris were always fond of their king, 
even in his dark days, and to please them he was taken 
out to church, or to some public show whenever he 
was well enough. AYhen he was not violent he was 
very gentle and patient; but the days passed slowly, 
and some kind-hearted person brought him some play- 
ing cards, which had been known before, but were 



CHARLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 125 

very little used. Charles liked them, and they helped 
to pass away many a tedious hour. 

The remainder of Charles's unhappy reign is only one 
dreary succession of quarrels between two great rivals 
who were struggling to gain the supreme power — the 
dukes of Burgundy and Orleans. When the old Duke of 
Burgundy died, his son, John Sans Peur, (without fear), 
took up the quarrel just where his father had left it, 
and a French writer says of him, " Nature seemed to 
have made him expressly to hate the Duke of Orleans." 
The latter was a handsome, gay young man, and a 
great favorite with the common people. Not tliat he 
ever did anything for them but spend their hard-earned 
money, but they were proud of him, and liked to see 
him riding through the streets on his prancing horse, 
bowino- to rio;ht and left like a true prince. John the 
Fearless was bitterly jealous of him, and as there was 
no lawful way of getting rid of him, he chose a way of 
his own. 

Orleans was dining one evening with the queen 
when a message was brought to him that^King Charles 
wanted to see him at the Hotel St. Pol. He set out 
immediately to obey the summons, and was riding 
along the streets, singing and playing with his glove, 
a few attendants only being with him, when suddenly 
a band of twenty armed men siDrang out upon him 
from a house w^here they had been lying in wait, cry- 
ing out, " Death ! Death !" " What's all this about?" 
inquired the duke, " I am the Duke of Orleans." 
"Just what we want," was the answer; and they fell 
upon him and fairly hacked him to pieces, so that when 
his servants came to look for the body, they could not 



126 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

find it all at once; the brains were scattered over the 
pavement, and a hand was picked up the next day out 
of the mud. 

The Duke of Burgundy seemed very much distressed 
by what had happened — perhaps he was so. Perhaps 
he would have gladly called the dead man to life again. 
He attended the funeral and wept bitterly when he 
saw the disfigured features. No one then thouo-ht of his 
being the murderer; but when people began to inquire 
into what had been done, his guilt was so plain that 
he put spurs to his horse and galloped towards his own 
dominions. He soon came back, however, and boldly 
acknowledged the deed, saying that he did it for the 
good of France, and he made a ''celebrated preacher 
deliver a sermon in which the act was applauded as that 
of a good patriot. 

But the quarrel was not at an end. The eldest son 
of the murdered duke married the dauo^hter of the 
Count of Armagnac, a nobleman who now became the 
head of the Orleans party, which from this time was 
called by his name. For the next seven years the 
history of France is one scene of horror. An associa- 
tion was formed in Paris among the party who favored 
the duke of Burgundy, sometimes called "^'Corch- 
eurs," which means "Skinners," and sometimes "Cabo- 
chiens," from the name of their leader, Caboche. 
These miscreants, under the guidance of butchers and 
hangmen, made the pretence of defending the city an 
excuse for murder, robbery, and outrages too horrible 
to be repeated. When any one offended them they 
only needed to say "there's an Armagnac!" and 
either dispatched him on the spot and plundered his 



CHARLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 127 



house, or dragged him off to prison till he should pay 
for his release. Then the Armagnacs forced their way 
into the city and took their turn in the work of destruc- 
tion; next the duke of Burgundy appeared with an 
army, drove off the Armagnacs and again deluged the 
streets of Paris with blood, abandoning to torture and 
starvation those of the opposite party, seizing upon 
their property, and when they died, throwing their 
corpses into the common ditches, to be devoured by 
dogs and swine. 

In the country it was no better. Every ruffian who 
wanted to live by plunder had only to put on the white 
scarf of the Armagnacs or the blue hood of the Bur- 
gundians, and he had a w^arrant for all his evil deeds. 
Every princi^ole of justice and honor was forgotten by 
high and low. Secret associations, midnight drown- 
ings, hideous tortures, were as much the work of the 
ffreat as of the most deo-raded. The streets were 
paraded day and night by parties of Cabochiens, armed 
with knife in hand and mallet on shoulder, keeping 
order by striking down instantly all who opposed them. 
While such things were going on, it was only natural 
that the enemies of France should take the occasion to 
invade her blood-stained soil. News came that Henry 
the Fifth was on his way from England, and the 
Hundred Years' war broke out anew. 

Even if Henry's claim had been a good one, the 
French nobles would hardly have stood by quietly and 
allowed him to conc[uer their country. They could 
destroy one another, but wanted no stranger to meddle 
in their business. Almost the whole nobility of France 
rushed into this fatal war. The armies met upon the 



128 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

field of Agincourt, where was fought the third of those 
great battles gained by a handful of English over a 
force many times greater than their own. The story of 
Crecy and Poitiers was repeated. The French, hasty, 
impetuous, and unskillfuUy placed by the Constable 
d'AIbret, their leader, were driven back in confusion, 
while the cool-headed English king took advantage of 
eYQYj point left open to him. 

When King Henry bad conquered the whole of Nor- 
mandy, the princes in Paris began to think it was 
time to be up and doing. The Dauphin Charles was 
now sixteen, old enough to have some share in the 
government; and, as he had always been under the 
influence of the Orleanist party, had never been on 
good terms with the Duke of Burgundy. But in order 
that they might arrange together some measures for 
driving back the English, the Duke was invited to 
meet Charles on the bridge of Montereau. His friends 
warned him that he placed his life in danger, but' he 
justified his name by turning a deaf ear to them. A 
pavilion was made in the middle of the bridge into 
which the Dauphin and the Duke entered, each with 
ten attendants. The Duke took off his plumed hat 
and bent his knee before the son of his King. While 
in this position, a follower of the Daupliin, named 
Tanneguy-Duchatel, struck him a furious blow on the 
head with a hatchet, and others rushed forward and fin- 
ished the work with their swords. Those who were 
with him were either killed or taken prisoners. Thus 
perished, in the prime of life, John the Fearless, Duke 
of Burgundy. The murder of Orleans was avenged. 

We come now to the last scene in which we shall 



CHARLES THE WELL-BELOVED. 129 

see Charles the Sixth play the puppet in the hands of 
his enemies, for all were his enemies, whether 
French or Enoflish. There was none to care for the 
silent sufferer, to whom gleams of reason came just 
often enough to show him the mournful state of his 
country, and arouse him to make a feeble effort to 
stay the tide of her distresses. Philip of Burgundy, 
the son of the murdered duke, ranged himself on the 
side of the English, in hopes of revenge on the Arm- 
agnacs. The Queen, who hated her son, eagerly fol- 
lowed him, and a treaty was made at Troyes in 1^20 
between Henry and Charles, which goes almost be- 
yond the power of imagination to dream of. Henry 
the Fifth was to marry Charles's daughter Catherine, 
was to be Reo-ent of France durino: the life-time of 
its sovereiofn, and kina* at his death. Not a word of the 
Dauphin, except that both parties bound themselves 
to have nothing to do with Charles, "calling himself 
Dauphin." The poor crazy king signed the treaty, 
probably without knowing what he was doing ; and 
such was the state of wretchedness to which the peo- 
ple of France had been reduced, that they were actu- 
ally satisfied with the treaty of Troyes, which gave 
them into the hands of the strano-er. 

Armagnac is now made Constable, and Queen Isa- 
bella, disgraced, is shut up in a castle away from the 
capital. Children in the street who have been taught 
to sing a song beginning " Burgundy's duke, God give 
thee joy," are beaten to the ground without knowing 
why ; Armagnac is everything. 

And now once more the scene changes. The Queen, 
though closely watched, manages to send her golden 
9 



130 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

seal to the Duke of Burgundy, with the message that 
if he will call for her, she will go with him. The Duke 
would have come on a slighter invitation. He appears 
at Paris with an army; the mob, at sight of him, recov- 
ers heart and besfins ao^ain the work of destruction ; 
the Constable d'Armagnac is torn to pieces, amidst fero- 
cious howls and cries of joy ; the prisons, into which 
the Arinagnacs had at first been thrust, are broken 
open and the prisoners murdered one by one ; those 
who shut themselves up are smoked out ; others are 
pitched from the windows and caught on pikes by the 
crowd below ; cries of " Burgundy ! Death to the 
Armagnacs ! " fill the air ; the Constable's body, hewn 
in quarters, is distributed about the town so that all 
may see it ; little children play in the streets with the 
corpses ; strips of fi.esh are cut from the bleeding backs 
of the Armagnacs and left hanging to the neck, to 
represent the white scarfs they wore ; the Duke of 
Burgundy in vain tries to restore order, even shaking 
hands with the head-butcher, to make friends with him ; 
fiends seem to have taken the place of men. 

At last the butchers began to be worn out by their 
excesses ; a few of them were executed, and something 
like quiet restored. Henry of England, in the mean- 
time, was attending to his business thoagh the French 
had forgotten theirs. He laid siege to the old city of 
Rouen, taken from his ancestor John Lackland by 
Philip Augustus more than two hundred years before, 
and, having taken it, pursued his victorious march 
through the country. 

Two years more saw both kings laid in the grave; 
and strange to say, Henry, young and strong when they 



CHABLES THE VICTORIOUS. 131 

put their hands together to the treaty of Troyes, was 
the first to go. The one whose life had been a living 
death was left for a month or two longer, constantly 
mourning for his good son Henry, his dear Henry, who, 
to his disordered mind, replaced the children to whom 
he had been so many years a stranger. 

When the common people knew that their king was 
dead, the old affection which had given him the name 
of the Bien-aime — the Well-beloved — burst out afresh. 
They went in crowds to the Hotel St. Pol to gaze for 
the last time on those wasted features which had never 
looked on them but with kindness; they sobbed and 
cried and said they should never again have a king so 
good to them as he had been — that he had gone to his 
rest and reward, while nothing was left to them but 
sorrow. Only a few officers, whose duty made it neces- 
sary, accompanied the body of the king to its tomb 
in St. Denis. Not one of his own family was there, 
and no person of high rank except the English Duke 
of Bedford; but the hearts of his people, a nobler 
retinue, were with him to the end. 



CHAPTER XV. 

CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 1422-1461. 

T would have been hard to tell who was Kinof 
of France now. There was a little Ens"lish 
baby, nine months old, proclaimed in Paris 
under the name of Henry the Sixth. And there was 
Charles the Seventh, of France, twenty years old, who 




132 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

called himself king, but had not been crowned, and 
didn't quite know what to do about it. He was an 
indolent young man, with no taste for fighting, and 
never went " o a battle if he could help it, though he 
was most absurdly called The Victorious, because 
stout work was done, although it was done by others. 

We can scarcely believe that this descendant of 
Hugh Capet lived quietly in the town of Bourges, 
amusing himself in various ways, even talking of 
leaving France altogether to the English, and taking 
refuge elsewhere. 

If he had stopped his dancing and singing long 
enough to go about a little among his own people, (for 
in the south of France there were laro;e districts not 
yet conquered by the English), he would have seen a 
sorry state of things. An old writer says: "There 
was nothing but a horrible confusion, poverty, solitude 
and fear. Even the cattle, accustomed to the larum- 
bell, the sign of the enemy^s approach, would at its 
sound run home of themselves." The country was 
infested with wolves, who fought for the bodies of the 
dead, and even made their way into the cities in search 
of jDrey. The burying-grounds, with their hastily 
made graves, were full of them. 

At one time food was so scarce that when the doo;- 
killer went his rounds he was followed by a crowd of 
poor people who would seize the carcasses of the ani- 
mals and devour them greedily, entrails and all, to 
satisfy their cruel hunger. In some of the cities they 
tried to relieve their misery by a strange amusement. 
These starving wretches would go by night to the 
cemeteries, hundreds of them together, and dance and 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 133 

sin;^ and shout madly among the graves so as to for- 
get, for a little while at least, what they suifered in 
the day-time. This was called the " Danse Macabre " 
or dance of death. In the morning, exhausted by 
their wild gayety, they would creep back to their 
wretched homes. 

Charles saw nothing of all this ; if it was told him 
he probably laughed at it as a good joke. He always 
had enough to eat and drink, though according to the 
story, not always enough to wear. It is said that a 
shoemaker from whom he ordered a pair of boots 
refused to leave them without the money, which Charles 
did not have. But nothing disturbed his easy good- 
nature. Boots or no boots, he enjoyed life as he went 
alono;. 

In the meantime, the bov-kino; at Paris, the littl e o o n 
..-^ Henry the Sixth, was growing up under the care of 
liis uncles, sometimes in London, sometimes in Paris, 
as the case might be. The Duke of Bedford, who had y , y ^ 
been left Regent of France by Henry the Eigh^feh, ^^'^^]r^//fr^ 
an upright man, but could do little to lessen the mise- f 
ries caused by the war. Besides, his great object in 
life was to conquer the rest of France, not to make 
it pleasant for the part already conquered. 

Queen Isabella, who might have done so much good 
and who did so much harm, lived quite alone with her 
servants in the great hotel St. Pol, forlornly enough, for 
thouo^h the Eno-Hsh lords treated her with outward re- 
spoct she must have known that they despised her. Lit- 
tle Henry was once riding by her palace when some one 
pointed to an old woman standing at one of the win- 
dows and told him it was his grandmother. He lifted 



134 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

his hat respectfully; the Queen bowed very low to him, 
then turned away and burst into tears. She lived long 
enough to repent of her misdoings, wdiether she did so 
or not. When she died, the sculptor who was told to 
make a tomb for her carved a wolf on it as an emblem 
of her cruelty and greediness, instead of a dog, the 
emblem of fidelity, which was sometimes put on 
tomb-stones. 

The war gradually narrowed itself down into a con- 
test for the possession of the town of Orleans. The 
Eno;lish, who were besieo-ino; it had built a sort of 
town outside of it, with great towers called bastilles, 
from which they could fire their stone cannon-balls into 
the town ; for by this time cannon had come into com- 
mon use. All the bravest and most experienced men 
on both sides had collected about this important place, 
and each party felt that the final victory would be with 
the one who should win it. 

The Duke of Bedford had sent from Paris a large 
supply of food for the English, among which there 
were many barrels of salted herrings. The French, 
shut up in the town, hearing of this, thought it was a 
fine chance to get in some provisions, of which they 
were greatly in need. So they sent out a party of 
soldiers to meet the herrings and other good things, but 
made their attack so rashly that, they were driven 
back in confusion, while the barrels were burst open 
by the cannon-balls and their contents scattered on 
the ground. This is called in ridicule, the " Battle 
of the Herrings," because there were more fish than 
soldiers to be found on the field afterwards. 

AVe must now leave the scene of war, and wander 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 135 



away to the village of Dorareray, in Lorraine, where 
there lived at this time a yoang peasant girl named 
Jeanne Dare. Her father and mother were plain, 
respectable people, and she helped them with what- 
ever they had to do, sometimes tending cattle and 
sheep in the fields, sometimes sewing with her mother 
in the house. From her childhood she had always had 
a horror of the English. One day when she was about 
nine years old, the dreadful cry was heard, " The En- 
glish are coming!" and her family and all the people 
who could get away ran off as fast as they could, only 
to find ou their return that their pretty village had 
been sacked and burnt to the ground. From thinking 
a great deal about these things, and at the same 
time keeping long fasts until her body was worn out 
and she became a little light-headed from weakness, 
she began to fancy that she saw wonderful visions 
of saints and angels, and heard heavenly voices 
teilino- her that she should deliver France from the 
enemy. 

This conviction of her divine mission increased until 
she felt impelled to set out for Orleans to carry it out, 
much against her father's will. When she sent word 
to the commanding French general that she had come 
to raise the siege, and to have the king crowned at 
Rheims, he said, " Box the girl's ears and send her 
home." But she kept on quietly until she found some 
one who would take her to the king. By this time 
every body had heard of the Maid, and her visions and 
her voices and her promises; and without believing in 
her, all were curious to see her. She was tall and fine- 
looking, and for convenience in riding on horseback, 



136 HISTORY OF FBANCE, 

put on a man's dress, which was quite suitable for one 
who was going to fight. 

There are several wonderful stories told about her, 
which were fully believed in by the people of that 
time. One was that she described an old sword with 
five crosses on the blade which nobody then living had 
ever seen, but which was found behind the altar of St. 
Catherine's Church at Fierbois, just where she said it 
would be. Another was that when she was brought 
into the presence of the Dauphin he purposely retired 
amono- the crowd, and sent forward a nobJeman who 
pretended to be the King; and that she put this man 
aside and picked out the real Charles in a minute with- 
out ever having seen him. And still another, that she 
took him aside and told him of a certain prayer he had 
made, which no one could possibly know of but him- 
self. 

No doubt these things could easily be explained if 
we knew a little more about them; but at any rate, 
both Charles and his advisers pretended to be con- 
vinced by them. They thought it more prudent, how- 
ever, to get the opinions of some learned clergymen 
on the subject, and had her examined by them to see 
whether her visions did not come from evil spirits in- 
stead of good ones. Some of her answers are so 
shrewd that it is plain she had plenty of mother-wit, 
if nothing else. One wise doctor saiJ: "If it is 
God's will to deliver France by your means, he has no 
need of soldiers." She answered instantly, "The 
soldiers will do the fighting, and God will give them 
the victory." Another, who came from a part of France 
where people did not speak very good French, asked 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 137 

her what language the heavenly Voices spoke to her. 
"A better one than yours," she retorted. None of the 
old o;entlemen lauo-hed at this, as thev would do now- 
a-days if a young girl made them such a sharp answer, 
but on the whole they decided that it was quite safe to 
let her go on and do what she could. 

And now we have her at last just as she had been 
lono-ino- to be. Mounted on a mao-nificent white war- 
horse, dressed in a shining suit of armor, the old sword, 
well-polished, hanging from her belt, a w^iite banner 
embroidered with golden lilies carried before her, and 
a large body of men-at-arms at her back, escorting a 
supply of provisions — the young peasant-girl set boldly 
forward to fulfill her mission ; to save France and crown 
its lawful king. Strangely enough, the English offered 
no opposition, and she passed safely into the city of 
Orleans. 

When the first wild shout of joy that greeted her 
arrival had ceased, Jeanne set about her work. lean 
not tell you all the particulars of this strange story. 
No wonder that the English thought she was helped 
by evil spirits. In less than two weeks they met with 
such continual defeats in the fights which took place 
between them and the soldiers from the city, that they 
moved off of their own accord, leaving behind them 
not only their baggage and artillery, but also their 
wounded companions and many French prisoners. 

The first part of the Maid's promise was fulfilled; she 
had raised the seige of Orleans. Can you wonder that 
the people were almost beside themselves with wonder 
and delight? 

When the English had gone away, Jeanne went out 



138 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to meet the king. Charles was much pleased to see 
her and took off his cap to her, which was a rare 
piece ol" condescension in a king; but when she wanted 
him to go on to Rheims and be crowned, he hung his 
head and made all sorts of objections; he had not 
troops enough, he had no money, the English had pos- 
session of the city and of all the country leading to it. 
It did not seem to him, as it did to the Maid, that he 
could cut his way through; and it was only after re- 
peated urging that he at last got up spirit enough to 
set out. 

On the way they had some splendid successes, and 
a,s they drew near the city of Rheims the gates opened, 
and a deputation came out, offering Charles the keys. 
There, in the beautiful cathedral, with his great 
men about him and the Maiden, with her beloved 
standard in her hand, at his side, he was crowned king 
of France. The archbishop anointed his head with 
the holy oil from the same vial, if we may believe 
what we are told, from wdiich it was poured on the 
head of Clovis as he knelt at the same spot. Jeanne 
was overcome, and cried like a baby. She fell at the 
king's feet and clasped his knees, exclaiming in a pas- 
sion of tears that now she had done what she was sent 
to do, and that since the gentle king was crowned, all 
she asked was that she might go home and tend sheep 
again on her father's farm. 

The king did not wish her to go home so long as he 
thought she could be of any use to him, but neither 
did he help her heartily, and matters dragged along 
very unsatisfactorily. He gave her father a title of 
nobility, with the name of De Lys, in memory of the 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 139 

lilies on her banner; but she would much rather have 
had him work vigorously in driving out the English. 
Months passed away without any great change; some- 
times one party had the advantage, sometimes the 
other; nothing could rouse the sluggish Charles into 
making any exertion. 

At last the end came. Jeanne had made a success- 
ful attack on Compiegne, and most of the army had 
forced their way in; but she herself and a few soldiers 
were still outside, fighting. Suddenly the gates were 
shut and the drawbridge raised, and she was left at the 
mercy of the enemy. It was said at the time that this 
was done intentionally; but it seems more probable 
that the commander in the city feared that the English 
would enter affain, and wished to make sure of the 
prize. At all events, we can give him the benefit of 
the doubt. 

Left thus almost alone, the Maid became a mark 
for all eyes. She was easily recognized by her armor, 
which was well known in both armies, and a soldier in 
the service of Count John of Luxembourg, (who was a 
knight in the Burgundian army), pulled her off her 
horse,' and took her to his master. Jeanne Dare was a 
prisoner in the hands of her eneihies. 

The Count was poor and the Duke of Bedford knew 
it. Taking: him on his weak side the Duke offered him a 
large sum of money — ten thousand francs — if he would 
sell the helpless prisoner, that the vindictive English 
nation mig-ht do with her as they would. He hesitated 
a long time over the bargain, and his wife fell on her 
knees before him entreating him not to disgrace him- 
self. If he had any feelings of honor he must have 



140 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

known what a shameful trade it was; but the tempta- 
tion was too strong. The money was paid and the 
English seized their prey. 

And where was Charles the Seventh all this time ? 
Was he straining every nerve to raise a ransom for 
the poor girl, which the rules of war would have 
obliged the Count to take? Was he making appeals 
to her countrymen not to let the favorite of Heaven, as 
they had long thought her, fall into the hands of the 
wolves who were thirsting for her blood? Did he 
offer English prisoners, of whom he had many, in 
exchange? He did absolutely nothing. He sat still 
in stupid indifference and left her to her fate. 

The English Regent, the Duke of Bedford, knowing 
that all the world would cry shame upon him if he 
killed a defenceless prisoner who had been taken in 
open fight, did the most cruel thing that wickedness 
could devise — ho handed her over to the bishops. 
They pretended to think her an enemy to the Church 
and a sorceress who used unlawful arts, though it was 
plain to every one who had ever been with her that 
she was as religious as she was patriotic; but they 
were friends of the English and angry because she 
had helped her own countrymen against them, so it 
was resolved that she should die. 

If they had hanged or beheaded her at once, it 
would have been merciful in comparison with their 
methods. Sixteen times did they bring her out from 
the dungeon, with heavy irons on her hands and feet, 
to answer the cruel questions in which they tried in 
every way to entrap her into saying that she had been 
helped by the devil. She gave such simple, straight- 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 141 

forward answers, so wise too, that they failed to make 
out what they wanted to, and finally induced her to 
sign a paper, (which she had to do by making a mark 
with the pen, for she could not write), confessing that 
she had been wrono- in some thino-s she believed in. 

She was finally pronounced guilty of heresy, and con- 
demned to be kept in prison for life Avith nothing to 
eat and drink but " the bread of affliction and the 
water of affliction." But nothino; short of her death 
would satisfy the English ; and making a miserable 
excuse about her having broken a promise to them, 
her judges condemned her to be burnt alive. 

She had no time for preparation, and she asked for 
none, for she knew too well that it would be refused. 
While they were passing the sentence a great pile of 
sticks was laid up in the market-place at Rouen, and 
from the hall of judgment she was led out to it. 
Over the scaffold were written the words, " Heretic, 
apostate, idolater." She did not see them, for she was 
humbly kneeling in prayer until she was led to the 
top of the dreadful pile ; then the torch was set to it 
acd as the flames blazed up around her she was seen 
at the last moment pressing the crucifix to her lips. 

No Frenchman — no Englishman — should read poor 
Jeanne's story without tears of grief and shame. 

Though the Maid of Orleans was dead, her work 
went on. A very wise and able man called the Count 
de Richemont, who was Constable of France, but had 
been banished from court by the same jealous favorites 
who had set the kino- a2:ainst Jeanne, was recalled 
and made prime minister. The Duke of Burgundy 
was very tired of fighting, and was persuaded to 



142 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

make peace with Charles on his own account by the 
treaty of Arras, leaving the English to get out of the 
war in any way they thought proper. 

This, then, was the end of the long and murderous 
strife between the Buro-undians and the Armao-nacs. 
Both sides agreed to forgive and forget, and we see 
the beginning of better times in the fact then when 
Paris was taken from the English, neither party tried 
to take vengance on the old enemies who were found 
there. Charles entered his capital in triumph after an 
absence of nineteen years. 

A French writer who lived at that time calls this 
king " Charles the Well-served/' which would be a 
better title for him than the more common one of The 
Victorious. It was not alone in war that he found 
faithful servants. Money has been called "the sinews 
of war ; " it was the very back-bone of Charles's, and 
without the generous assistance of a rich merchant 
named Jacques Coeur, he might never have won back 
his whole country. True to his character, the king 
was afterwards basely ungrateful to him ; but France 
had been saved. 

A sketch of times like these would not be complete 
if no mention were made of a state of things that could 
not have existed in any century later than the fifteenth. 
This was the utter lawlessness of the great nobility, 
not only towards their dependents, but even to one 
another. We read of a Duke of Brittany who starves 
his brother to death within hearing of the passers-by, 
of whom he piteously begs a morsel of bread for char- 
ity ; of a Count of Guelders who drags his old father out 
of bed, makes him walk on foot many miles bare-foot 



CHARLES THE VICTORIOUS. 143 

throuo-h the snow, and then throws him into an 
underground dungeon, from which he never comes out 
alive ; of a Lord of Giac's poisoning his wife, and then 
makino; her gret on horseback behind him and ride till 
she dropped dead ; and lastly, of a nobleman named 
De Retz, who was proved to have enticed more than 
a hundred little children into his castle, and then mur- 
dered them for his own pleasure. The tears and groans 
of the parents as they told their pitiful stories moved 
the judges' hearts, and they shuddered with horror, 
though they were used to hearing such things. De 
Retz was condemned to be burned ; but being of noble 
blood, the executioner was allowed to strangle him first, 
that he might not suffer. 

After the peace of Arras a change seemed to come 
over the character of the king. He was just as un- 
grateful as ever, but he became more energetic, and 
seems during that part of his life to have been quite 
the model of a " working king." Some writers say 
that this is due to the influence of Agnes Sorel, one 
of the queen's ladies of honor, who became a favorite 
with Charles, and is said to have shamed him into behav- 
ing like a man; others think it was the good and sen- 
sible men about him, Richeraont and others, whose ex- 
ample roused him to action when he was tired of the 
follies of his youth. 

Whatever it was, France had reason to be thankful. 
x\mono- other grreat reforms was the establishment of a 
standing army, or body of regularly paid troops, so 
that there could be no more excuse for bands of 
"skinners" to desolate the country thus protected. 
The detested English were driven out of one place 



144 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

after another, until in 1453 not a foot of French soil 
remained in their hands except Calais and a little strip 
around it. The Hundred Years' War was over. 

The latter years of Charles the Seventh's life are 
sad enough. He grew indolent and careless again, 
but that did little harm now that everything was in 
good working order. His worst trials came from his 
undutiful and perverse son, Louis the Dauphin, who 
had been from his boyhood a thorn in his father's side. 
When he was only seventeen he joined in an insurrec- 
tion called the " Praguerie," and at the close of it in- 
solently said to his father, " My lord, if you will not 
pardon the rebels, I must go back with them, for I 
promised them I would." "Louis," answered the 
king, " the gates are open, .and if they are not wide 
enough, I'll have a hundred feet of wall knocked down 
for you, so that you can go where you please." 

But in spite of his coolness, Charles felt ill at ease, 
and sank into a state of low spirits that was not much 
better than his father's insanity. One of his counsel- 
lors wrote to him. "It pleases you to be shut up in 
castles, wretched places, and all sorts of little holes, 
without showing yourself to your people and listening 
to their troubles." He had troubles enough of his 
own, poor man, and longed to see the Dauphin, who, 
knowing that his father was failing in health, was 
quietly waiting in Flanders for him to die. Charles 
became daily more unhappy, and finally, taking it into 
his poor weak head that Louis wanted to poison him^ 
refused to eat anything. In vain his favorite son, the 
Duke of Berri, offered to taste all the food first him- 
self; in vain the physicians and attendants tried to 



LOUIS XL 145 

convince him of the folly of throwing* away his life 
through fear of death*; he persisted with all the ob- 
stinacy of a disordered mind, and in a few days 
literally starved himself to death. And that was the 
end, so far as this world is concerned, of Charlesl:he 
Seventh; the Victorious, the Well-served, the Un- 
grateful. 




h 



CHAPTER XVI. 

LOUIS XI.— 1461-1483. 

HARLES the Seventh had named his oldest 
son after Saint Louis, in the hope that he 
might resemble him in character. He lived 
long enough to see how vain his hopes were. The 
religion which had dignified and ennobled the charac- 
ter of Louis the Ninth became in Louis the Eleventh 
only the lowest kind of superstition. He was never 
tired of praying to the Saints, who were the only 
sacred beings he seemed to consider worthy of his 
attention; but his prayers were not that he might " do 
justice and love mercy," but always that he might be 
successful in some undertaking or be spared from 
some loss. 

He walked about with half a dozen little leaden 
images of different saints stuck in his cap, and when 
he wanted anything very much, off would come the 
cap, and he would select the image of that saint who 
he imagined would be most likely to favor the matter 
in hand; then setting the morsel of lead on a table, 
10 



146 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

he would kneel before it, quite regardless of the pres- 
ence of others, and mutter his petitions. 

As far as looks went, Louis was very little like a 
king. He had a face full of vulgar cunning, and 
walked in an awkward, shambling manner; and as he 
chose to go about in garments which a respectable 
merchant would have been ashamed of, there was no 
" majesty " about him except the name. Yet this man 
of all others, was the first European prince to be 
addressed by the title "Your Majesty." He had one 
settled purpose in his mind, and from this he never 
turned aside. It was to bring all ranks of people, 
from princes to serfs, into something as nearly like 
slavery as possible, and of this nation of slaves he was 
to be the only master. He did not always succeed 
with the great; but the poorer classes, who had never 
tasted the sweets of liberty, were soon ground down 
into absolute submission to his will. 

The nobility were harder to manage. Being indig- 
nant at Louis's tyrannical interference with their priv- 
ileges, a great number of them bound themselves to- 
gether in what they called " The League for the Pub- 
lic Good." Philip de Cotnines, a historian who lived 
at that time, and who takes up 'the place left vacant by 
Froissart, says that this was formed " to remonstrate 
with the king upon the bad order and injustice he kept 
up in his kingdom." The League was kept secret as 
long as possible, but Louis employed too many spies 
to be long ignorant of any thing that went on, and in 
an address to his people on the subject he remarjced 
that if he had allowed his vassals to continue tyranniz- 
ing over their own subjects, as they had been used to 



LOUIS XL 147 

doing, they never would have concerned themselves 
about the " Public Good." This was very true, but it 
did not make the nobles more contented with the kiuir's 
severity towards themselves. 

We can judge of the nature of this severity when 
we read that he once had two gentlemen's ears cut 
off for killing a hare on their own land ! Such a king 
could not be very popular with the " privileged classes." 

Louis's treatment of the Cardinal de Balue was 
characteristic. This man was the son of a tailor, and 
Louis, finding him quick-witted and serviceable, had 
raised him to one high place after another, and at last 
required the Pope to make him a Cardinal. Instead 
of being entirely devoted to the interests of his 
benefactor, Balue engaged in various plots against 
him, and was at last found out. He richly deserved 
hanging, but that would have been too merciful for 
Louis, who wanted the pleasure of knowing that he 
was livins: and suffering:. 

He had an iron cage, about eight feet square and^ 
seven high, placed in the strong castle of Loches, and 
in this the unfortunate man was shut up like a wild 
beast for eleven years. The door was never opened; 
his food was passed in to him through a grating; his 
hair and nails grew to be like a mane and claws. It 
is said that Louis occasionally went to feast his eyes 
upon this pleasant sight. 

At last another Pope wanted the Cardinal let out, and 
as the king himself was nearly done with the world 
by^that time, and no longer able to go and visit his 
former favorite, the request was granted. 

The chief of Louis's "great vassals" was Charles 



148 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and the greater part of 
Charles's ten years' reign was only one long duel with 
his crafty neighbor. Louis, though cautious to excess, 
at one time formed the singular resolution of going to 
visit the Duke of Burgundy in his own dominions, to 
settle one of their innumerable quarrels. Being pro- 
vided with a " safe-conduct" he went to Peronne, where 
the duke met him with a great show^ of respect, kissed 
him and called him his dear brother, and they walked 
into the town, together, Louis laying his hand famil- 
iarly on Charles's shoulder. They talked over their 
affairs for some days in a friendly manner, when 
suddenly the Duke received news that some secret 
aorents of Louis had been excitino; an insurrection in 
the Flemish town of Liege. At this his rage knew no 
bounds. He was always hot-tempered, but this 
lashed him to fury. He had Louis locked up in the 
fortress where he was lodged, and for three days 
thought over plans of vengeance, determining to kill 
him then and there. Durino; one whole nio-ht he 
never undressed, but walked back and forth in his 
room in wild agitation. At last his anger cooled 
down a little, and some of his advisers, among whom 
was Philip de Comines, persuaded him not to violate 
his kingly word given in the safe-conduct, but to let 
Louis go, and try to revenge himself in some more 
creditable way. 

Louis was released, but Charles had his revenge. 
After forcing him to sign a treaty similar to the one 
he had broken, the Duke said: "And now please to 
come with me to Liege to help me punish the treason 
of these people of Liege, committed all through your 



LOUIS XL 149 

means!" The King did not dar^ to refuse, and much 
did it astonish the people he had paid to shout, 
"Hurrah for France!" to see him ridino* into the town 
with their angry Duke, shouting at the top of his 
voice, "Hurrah for Burgundy!" Charles forced him 
first to witness the storming and sacking of the town, 
and afterVard to go with him in a solemn procession 
to the great cathedral to give thanks for the victory; 
then, burning with rage and shame, he was allowed 
to depart. 

The people of Paris were not so much afraid of 
Louis but that they taught their parrots to scream 
out, " Peronne! " at the top of their voices. Louis 
did not go back there for some time, but one of his 
"gossips" was kept quite busy in wringing the necks 
of the poor birds, who only did as they had been told. 
Louis probably wished that th^y had but one neck, 
that he mio-ht wring; it once for all and have done 
with it. 

In Sir Walter Scott's novel of Quentin Durward 
there is a spirited account of this visit of Louis's, 
bringing out in strong relief the different characters 
of the Kina: and the Duke. 

As the history of France includes that of Burgundy, 
I must tell you here what remains of the story of 
Charles the Bold. Tired at last of measurino- his 
strength against Louis, he picked a quarrel with the 
Swiss mountaineers, and invaded their country. Here 
he got exactly what he deserved — a tremendous defeat 
— at the battle of Granson. He had taken a a:reat 
quantity of splendid things with him — why, one can 
hardly imagine, unless it was to impress these plain 



150 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

people with his vast 'wealth, — but he had to run away, 
leaving them all behind. A whole dinner-service of 
solid silver, a crown loaded down with jewels, the col- 
lar of the Order of the Golden Fleece, founded by his 
father, Philip the Good, which was a mass of precious 
stones, hundreds of pieces of magnificent silk, velvet, 
lace, damask, cloth of gold — all these and many more 
did the Duke leave behind him at Granson. 

They did the Swiss little good, however. The silver 
they supposed to be pewter, and sold it for a few pence; 
the gorgeous cloths and the tapestry from Arras, worth 
almost its weight in gold, were sold by the yard in 
shops like sixpenny calico ; the Duke's enormous soli- 
taire diamond, which had once been worn by the Great 
Mogul in India, was picked up in the road and at first 
thrown away by the finder, who afterwards thought, 
that as it was a pretty piece of glass, he might get a 
few shillino^s for it, which he did. This at leno;th found 
its way into the French crown, where it held its place 
for centuries as one of the richest jewels in Europe. 
Besides ail these, there were whole barrelfuls of money. 

Charles is often called The Rash ; he justified his 
name b}^ making another attack on Switzerland within 
three months, and again the same scenes were repeated 
in the battle of Morat. So many men were killed here 
that a hill was made of their bodies, which was cov- 
ered with earth, and went for three hundred years by 
the name of "Bone-hill." It was not duo- down until 
some time in the eighteenth century. 

Charles had not yet had enough fighting, so he 
next attacked the Duke of Lorraine at Nancy. This 
was the end. After the battle, which was another 



LOUIS XL 151 

overvvlielmino: defeat, no Charles the Bold was to be 
seen. A search was made among the dead on the 
field, and there, lying face downward in a frozen marsh, 
lay all that was left of Louis's great enemy. As they 
raised the head from the ice in which it was imbedded, 
apiece of the skin came off, showing a ghastly wound. 

The Duke of Lorraine had the dead body dressed in a 
white satin gown and laid on a bed of black velvet, 
under a black satin canopy; a ducal crown was placed 
on the disfigured head, and the gilded spurs of a knight 
bound on the heels. Tlien the generous Duke, having 
done all that he could for his rash and willful enemy, 
had him buried with the honors due to his rank. 

To relate all the struggles between Louis and his 
great vassals, would fill a book. His enemies were a 
sort of Hydra; as soon as a head was cut oif, others 
sprang up in its place. He generally came off victo- 
rious in these contests, but it was at the price of 
never enjoying a moment's peace. The grim irony 
of his invitation to the Count of St. Pol, Constable of 
France, is well known: "My cousin," he wrote to 
him, "weighty matters are pending, in which a head 
like yours would be of great use to us." In conver- 
sation with those near him, Louis added, that it was 
only the head of the Constable that he wanted — his 
body might stay where it was. He afterwards obtained 
the head and body together, and separated them at 
his pleasure. 

One of his standing quarrels was with Edward the 
Fourth of Eii2:land, ao-ainst whom he had alwavs 
some ground of complaint, but they did not come to 
actual fiirhtino:. At one time Edward invaded France 



152/ HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

with a large army and imich boasting, meaning to act 
over again tlio scenes of Crccy, Poitiers ami Agin- 
court; but he had grown lazy and hixurious, and 
was bougiit olV at the treaty of Pecquigny, to the 
great distrust of his sohliers. Rememberino; John the 
Fearless at tiio bridge of Montereau, Louis provided 
against treachery l)y having a solid j)lank wall built 
in the center of the bridge on which he and b]dward 
were to meet, without any o})ening except a lattice 
through which these two mighty kings did their talk- 
ing. Having taken these precautions, they arranged 
the terms of peace. 

Once more Edward made ready for an invasion of 
France, but the hand of doath stopped him in the 
midst of his preparations, and Louis survived him but a 
sliort time. For two or three years before his death, the 
life of Louis the Eleventh had been only a wretched 
attempt at living. Conscious that liis iiand had been 
against every man, he imagined t)ie haiul of every 
man to be against him. He shut himself up in the 
gloomy old castle of Plessis-les-Tours, of whi(*h the 
grounds were Ulleil with man-traps. A ghastly row of 
gibbets \\no(] the approach to the castle, and the trees in 
the forest were loaded \\\t\\ "human fruit.'*' Ilis senti- 
nels had orders to shoot or hang without inquiry any 
one wlu"> approached the castle except his own mes- 
senger; even his children and otiiers of the royal 
family w^m-c not allowed to vi^it him without special 
invitation. 

His three favorite compnnions for years had been his 
hangman, Tristan 1/ llermite, whom he kept constantly 
busy; his barber, Olivier le Dain, who amused him by 



LOUIS XL 153 

liis jests and familiarity; and lastly liis pliysician, ,Tac- 
quos Coottier, a brutal follow who had induced an 
astrolo<2;er to tell the king- that he would live only three 
days aftt^r the doctor's death. Filled witli this idea, 
Louis IxMMuie almost a slave to this man, who minag-ed 
to frio-hten him into a'ivini>* him enormous sums of 
money. 

As death approached Louis became more abjectly 
superstitious tiian ever. He beg-i^ed one saint after 
another to spare his miserable life, but the saints paid 
no attention. He loaded himself with all sorts of 
relics — a fino-er of one dead saint, a too of another, a 
sha])eless fragment of bone from a third, hoping that 
somehow or other their holiness would strike in, and 
cure, not the wickedness of his heart, but the diseases 
of his body. When the [)eoplo about him were pray- 
ing for the health of his body and the salvation of his 
soul, he intenuptcd them: "Ask only for the cure of 
the body," said he. "Don't plague the saint with too 
many things at once." But all this did no good, and 
ho found himself at last obliged to lot>k the great De- 
stroyer full in the face. Even then he tried to shut 
his eyes to it. " When the last moment has come," 
said he to his attendants, " don't mention the word 
'death,' but just say, *You mustn't talk much;' I 
shall mulerstand you."" He gave all the directions for 
his funeral as minutely as if he had been an under- 
taker, seeming' as if he could not forego the j^leasure 
of being obeyed, even in death. 

Louis the Eleventh has been called " the worst 
father, the worst son, and tlio most brutal husband in 
all Christendom." At the same time, we uuist remember 



154 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

that he did a g:reat deal towards raakinp; France 
the uDited and powerful country which from his time 
it has remained. Many of his regulations were wise; 
he encouraged commerce, and did much to raise the 
condition of the middle classes, and though these 
benefits came from no motive hio;her than a sordid 
selfishness, it can not be denied that he left his country 
more prosperous than he found it. The people who 
had felt his tyranny and witnessed his degrading 
superstition could not appreciate this, however; and 
one of the most accurate of historians says, "For a 
long time past, no king of France had been so heavy 
on his people, or so hated by them." 




CHAPTER XVIL 

CHARLES VIII. LOUIS XII. — 1483-1515. 

SMALL, sickly boy of thirteen, so mis- 
^1 shapen that he might almost be called de- 
formed, was now King of France. The best 
thino; known about him is that he was surnamed " The 
Courteous," and that personally he was much beloved. 
His father, Louis the Eleventh, had kept him ignorant, 
so that he might never interfere in the government. 
All the Latin he would let hiui learn was this saying: 
" Qui nescit dissimulare nesclt Tegnaref " He who 
does not know how to deceive does not know how to 
reign." But the boy probably soon forgot it, for 
he seems to have been truthful, though he never 



CHARLES VIII. LOUIS XII. 155 

learned much that was worth knowhig about govern- 
ing. His sister, Lady Anne de Beaujeu, who had been 
made regent, was a very able woman ; spirited, but 
not self-willed, and knowing how to yield gracefully 
when it became necessary. 

The States-General, assembled soon after the death 
of the late king, made a touching statement of the 
woes of the poor. 

" During the last four years," they said, " the King's 
troops have been continually passing and repassing 
through France, and living on the people. The poor 
peasant must pay for the man who beats him, who 
carries off his property, who turns him out of his 
house. When the poor man has, by the sale of the 
clothes off his back, managed to pay his tax, then comes 
a new troop of soldiers, eating up and destroying the 
little provision he has left, and, not satisfied with 
what they find in his wretched hut, compelling him, 
with many blows, to go to the towns to seek for lux- 
uries for them, such as wine, fine white bread and 
fish; so that, if God did not comfort the poor man, he 
would utterly dispair. In Normandy, a countless 
multitude have died of hunger; others have killed 
their wives, their children and themselves, and others, 
fearing that if seen in the day-time they will be seized 
for not having paid their tax, are compelled to work 
at nio-ht." 

What a dreary picture of want and suffering ! 
But it made little impression on the court people, who 
must have their splendid houses and furniture, their 
gorgeous dress and equipages, their almost countless 
servants and costly pleasures. The Lady x\nne and 



156 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

her council received the petitions most graciously, 
and promised that the matter should be looked into; 
some trifling reforms were made, and then every thing 
went on just as it had done before. 

When Charles was twenty years old, his sister 
thouo;ht that the best thing: he could do would be to 
marry Anne of Brittany, a rich heiress, whose father 
had lately died and left her that duchy. To be sure, 
he was betrothed to the dauo;hter of Maximilian of 
Austria, and Maximilian was already married by proxy 
to Anne of Brittany, but such trifles made no diff"er- 
ence, when a prize like this was in question. So 
Charles marched into Brittany with an army and be- 
sieged the city of Rennes, where the poor, deserted, 
half-married Duchess was living. Backed by his army, 
he won the day, and the Pope granted Anne a divorce 
from her distant and apparently indifferent husband. 

Maximilian was very angry, for he had received a 
double insult, through his betrothed daughter and his 
betrothed wife; but the state of his afi'airs not allowing 
him to go to war with Charles, he made no trouble 
about it. He took back his daughter, who had been 
living in France ever since she was two years old, and 
Avas consoled not long afterward by being elected Em- 
peror of Germany. 

When Charles was married he did not even know 
how to read. He soon learned, however, for he felt 
ashamed of his ignorance; and as he was of a roman- 
tic turn of mind, he spent his time in poring over 
stories which told of the wonderful adventures met with 
by knights of the olden time. This filling his head 
with useless longings turned out to be a great injury 



CHARLES VIII. LOUIS XII. 157 

to him and his country iu the end. Remembering an 
old cUaim of his family to Naples, he determined to go 
into Italy and conquer that country. He had no army 
ready Ibr such an enterprise, and he was so poor that 
he had to borrow money to start with; but his head was 
full of wild visions of conquest, and sober reason was 
the last thing he wished to listen to. So, disregarding 
the advice of his sister and all his best friends, he set 
out for Rome. He had not learned the lesson that 
distant possessions are generally points of weakness, 
instead of strength, to a nation. 

The Pope at that time was Alexander the Sixth, 
one of the most thoroughly wicked men who ever sat 
in the chair of St. Peter. When Charles asked him 
to bestow the kingdom of Naples upon him, he only 
hesitated for fear that it might bring him into trouble; 
not because it did not belong to either of them, nor 
to him. But at length he consented ; Charles was 
anointed with oil as holy as the blessing of such a 
pope could make it, and prepared to continue his 
journey. Before he left Rome, however, he and the 
Pope fell out; his Holiness retired into his strong 
castle of St. Angelo, and Charles allowed his soldiers 
one day of free pillage in the city of Rome. 

The soldiers being thus gratified, Charles kept on 
his way to the south, and long before he reached 
Naples, had the pleasure of hearing that the king and 
his son had both run away. The King, who was an 
atrociously bad man, was so hated by his people 
that they made Charles as welcome as possible, and 
entertained him with feasts and processions to his 
heart's content. There were bonfires and illuminations 



158 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

and all sorts of brilliant shows, and the conqueror 
wrote home that he had found "an earthly paradise." 

While he had been idling away his time in Naples, 
however, his enemies had been busily at work. A 
league was formed to cut off the retreat of his army, 
and he fought his way back into France, leaving only 
a rather weak garrison in Naples to maintain the honor 
and dignity of the French "conquest." Even this was not 
to last long. As soon as Charles was fairly oat of sight, 
the young King of Naples (for the old one had ended 
his worthless life soon after .being driven out of his 
kingdom), came back with the brave Gonsalvo de 
Cordova, Ferdinand of Aragon's " Great Captain," to 
help him, and made short work of the invaders. The 
French garrison was soon forced to surrender, and a 
fever broke out which carried off great numbers of 
them. A mere fragment of the gallant army remained, 
and were permitted to return unmolested to France. 

After the King's return he led an idle, intemperate 
life, neglecting all business of importance and giving 
himself up to low pleasures. At length these too, 
began to pall upon him, and for a change he proposed 
to make a reform, beginning with himself. 

At twenty-eight years old it is a little late to try 
such a plan, when one's youth has been passed in 
frivolity and dissipation, but Charles was quite in 
earnest. He had read that his ancestor, St. Louis, 
heard the complaints of the people, sitting under an 
oak tree, so he found a tree for himself and invited 
people to bring their causes before him. But he did 
not live to show what he might have done in his new 
state of mind. Going with the Queen one day to look 



CHARLES VIII. LOUIS XII. 159 

at a game of tennis, they had to pass through a gallery 
which had a very low door. Though he was short 
of stature he hit his head against this, and felt a little 
dizzv% but went on and watched the orame. In coming; 
back to the palace, while he was jDassing through this 
same gallery he suddenly lost consciousness; he was 
laid down on a wretched straw mattress that happened 
to be there, and in a few hours breathed his life away. 
His kindness of heart had made those about him so 
fond of him that all his faults were foro-otton. His 
queen, Anne of Brittany, grieved wildly over his loss, 
and one of his servants is said to have died of sorrow. 
How easy it would have been for any King of France 
in those days to make himself hero and saint for such 
long-suffering and loyal subjects! 

The Fifteenth Century was now coming to an end. 
It was a great century — the turning point between the 
old time and the new. In all the countries in the 
world, before that time, there were no printed books and 
only a few written ones; the Atlantic was not crossed 
and America discovered until nearly the end of that 
century, and it was only then that a very bold navi- 
o-ator had ventured to coast around the continent of 
Africa and so open a new sea-road to Asia and the 
East Indies. 

We think our nineteenth century a w^onderful one, 
with its railroads, steamboats and telegraphs, its sun- 
pictures, its immense advance in all the sciences, in- 
cluding the science of free government. But when 
we look far enough back to see the world as it was 
before gunpowder was invented or the mariner's com- 
pass brought into general use, and while printing was 



160 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

unknown, we get some idea of the darkness of the 
centuries before the fifteenth, aud we see that the 
coming of that era was somewhat like a surmise 
which made our later discoveries possible. It was in 
this age that France and Spain grew from groups of 
petty states at war among themselves, into strong 
kingdoms, having each a common interest — the pros- 
perity and glory of the whole nation. England, too, 
had seen the last of her great vassals, her Warwicks 
and Buckinghams, who openly rebelled against and 
defied their king. ]n short, we have now left behind 
the Middle Ages, and are fairly launched upon the sea 
of Modern History. 

As Charles the Eighth left no children, the crown 
fell to his cousin the Duke of Orleans, who now ascended 
the throne under the title of Louis the Twelfth, His 
life had up to this time been a hard one, for Louis the 
Eleventh had forced him to marry his daughter Jeanne, 
and he had been imprisoned by Anne of Beaujeu for 
plots against her government.. But he had always 
been popular w^ith the people. They loved him for 
his name, for his manliness, and for his nobility of 
character, before they found out that he Avas the people's 
friend. When one of his generals advised some harsh 
measures towards the enemies who had kept him so 
long in prison, he answered " It does not become the 
King of France to avenge the injuries of the Duke of 
Orleans." This generous sentiment united all hearts 
in his favor. From this time it may be said that he 
had not an enemy in his own country — a new order of 
thin2:s for a kino- of France. 

His economy both in public and private affairs was 



CHARLES VIII. LOUIS XII. 161 

so great that some people accused him of meanness. 
When he heard this, he said, " I would rather have 
my courtiers laugh at my saving than have my people 
weep at my spending." He provided for the regular 
payment and support of his army, so that they should 
no longer live by plundering the people, and then made 
pillage punishable with death. 

When the States-General met, they gave him the 
title of " Father of his Country," and surely no king 
of France ever deserved it better. The one blot upon 
his private character is his separation from Jeanne, the 
unfortunate daughter of Louis the Eleventh, to whom 
he had been married in his early youth. After obtain- 
ing from the infamous Pope Alexander the Sixth a 
divorce from her, he made use of his freedom to marry 
Anne of Brittany, once more uniting that coveted 
duchy to the Kingdom .of France. Anne was a woman 
of remarkable purity and goodness, and the French 
court, which had been noted for its dissipation and 
wicked gayety, became a model of propriety. The 
people could hardly get used to living under a king 
who paid his debts and lowered the taxes of his own 
accord; and it seemed to them as if the Golden Age 
they had read of had come to them in reality. 

But alas for the weakness of human nature! No 
sooner was the kingdom established in such peace 
and prosperity as had hardly been dreamed of since 
the days of Saint Louis, than the demon of ambition 
broke loose and whispered to him the fatal word 
—Italy ! 

We must recall the old imaginary claim to the 
kingdom of Naples — that country bestowed first by a 



162 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

pope who had no right to give it, on Charles of Anjou, 
who had no right to take it; given again by another 
pope to Louis of Anjou, brother of Charles the Wise, 
and since him vainly claimed by a succession of kings 
and dukes — this same old prize was still before the 
eyes of Louis the Twelfth, and he longed to stretch 
forth his hand and grasp it. 

With a well appointed army he marched south- 
ward, on his way to take possession of the Duchy of 
Milan, to which he also advanced some shadowy claim; 
then proceeded to Naples, which had a king of its 
own whom Ferdinand the Catholic, (King of Spain and 
husband of Isabella,) was trjnng to drive out. A 
shameful ao-reement was entered into betv^^een him 
and Louis, that they should conquer Naples together 
and then divide it between them. The Pope was 
quite ready to do his part, and " bestowed'' the coun- 
try on the two kings who wished to steal it, while the 
rightful sovereign, being allowed to retire into France, 
spent the rest of his days there in obscurity. 

As soon as the prize was fairly theirs, the royal 
wolves began to quarrel over it,- — the boundaries not 
having been very carefully settled, — each trying to 
get the lion's share. The Spanish General, Gonsalvo 
de Cordova, and the hot climate together, were more 
than a match for the French, and once more a few 
stragglers, worn out with illness, were all that ever 
reached France out of the gallant army who had gone 
forth so bravely to fight for her. 

It is impossible to relate here the plots and counter- 
plots, the tricks and surprises, by which the various 
sovereigns of Europe were constantly trying to outwit 



CHARLES nil. LOUIS XIL 163 

each other, and which go by the name of diplomacy. 
A few principal facts are all we have room for, and the 
blank pla,ces must be left to be filled in by larger histo- 
ries. 

The warlike Pope Julius the Second had succeeded 
Alexander the Sixth, and an agreement called the 
League of Cambrai was made between him, Ferdinand 
of Spain, the Emperor Maximilian and Louis of France, 
against the Venetians, whose only fault was that they 
were becoming too powerful and prosperous. Louis 
defeated them in battle, and saw in imagination all the 
north of Italy in his power. Next we hear of a "Holy 
League " formed by the Pope with these very same 
people against France. Then comes another invasion, 
and more battles, and more losses and retreats, until 
at last we find Louis, attacked on one side by his old 
ally, Ferdinand of Spain and on the other by Henry 
the Eighth of England, forced to stay at home and 
defend his own territory. A battle w^as fought near 
Terouenne between the French and English, which was 
called by the latter " The Second Battle of the Spurs;" 
not because, as at Courtrai, the spurs were picked up 
by bushels on the field, but because the French used 
them so vigorously in running away. Louis had now 
at last had enough of war, and was glad to make peace. 
Pity that he had ever broken it ! 

Henry the Eighth had a gay young sister named 
Mary, not yet sixteen years old, whom he had promised 
to Charles of Austria, afterward the Emperor Charles 
the Fifth. Besides this royal lover, the Princess Mary 
had one of her own, the Duke of Suffolk, to whom she 
was sincerely attached. But neither royal betrothal 



164 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

nor private affection could stand in the way when it 
was for the interest of kings to make a change; and 
the beautiful young girl was married to the man of 
fifty-three, worn out before his time by the hardships 
of war, and a martyr to gout. Louis naturally wanted 
to make life agreeable to his young wife, and in doing 
this did not remember that elderly people cannot change 
all their habits suddenly without risking their health. 
He had been used to dining (!) at eight in the morn- 
ing; he now took his dinner at the newly-fashionable 
hour of noon. His bed-time had, been six o'clock in 
the evening; now he often stayed up till midnight, for 
the balls and festivities in which the Queen delighted 
were sometimes prolonged to that unseemly hour. 
Just three months after the marriage-bells had rung out 
so merrily at the entry of the English queen, they 
tolled for the death of her husband. 

No king had ever been so mourned in France since 
the death of Louis the Ninth. The people's grief was 
most sincere; they knew it was very unlikely they 
should ever have another such sovereign. He had no 
sons, and his daughter Claude had married her cousin, 
Francis d'Angouleme, also descended from the first 
Duke of Orleans. As there was no nearer male heir, 
he now became King of France, under the title of 
Francis the First. 



FRANCIS I., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 165 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

FRANCIS I., THE KING OF THE GENTLEMEN.— 1515- 

1547. 




HAVE done the best I could for France," 
said Louis the Twelfth on his death-bed, 
" but that big boy D'Angouleme will spoil it 
all." 

The "big boy" was his son-in-law, Francis the 
First; a tall, handsome, self-willed youth of twenty, 
very much pleased to be a king, and so joyous in 
temper and affable in his manners that he became 
popular at once. 

Francis soon had a brilliant court around him. It 
did not take the nobles long to find out that instead 
of the frugal ways of Louis XIL they were to have 
all sorts of expensive amusements, and that the more 
splendidly they were dressed the more welcome they 
would be; so money was spent like water. The King, 
who was a perfect specimen of physical beauty, was 
fond of all kinds of games where strength and skill 
were required, and these disposed him to martial 
exercises. 

His first thought when he found himself a king was, 
natui-ally, of Italy, and in a few months he was on his 
way there with an immense army. The bloody battle of 
Marignano, the first in which he had ever been engaged, 
was a great victory for the French. Francis fought 
all day like a hero of romance, and at night lay down 
for a little rest with his head on a cannon, disdaining 



166 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

a better couch than his meanest soldier had. Faint 
with thirst, he asked for some water; but all that 
could be found was tinged with blood, and he turned 
away in horror. It was still the custom, though the 
days of chivalry were past, for kings to make knights 
on the battle-field of those who had fought most 
bravely (always provided they were of " gentle blood "); 
but before availing himself of this privilege, Francis 
asked the brave Bayard, called the knight '"'• scms 
peur et sans reproche^'' and already celebrated for 
many victories, to confer the honor upon him. 

"Sire," said Bayard, "the king who has been 
anointed with oil sent down from Heaven, he who is 
the eldest son of the Church, is already knight over all 
other knights." " Make haste, friend Bayard," replied 
the King, " don't stop to quote laws to me, but do as I 
bid you." So he knelt down, and Bayard struck him 
with the flat of his sword, saying, " May it avail as 
much as if I were Roland or Oliver, Geoifrey or Bald- 
win ; please God that in war you may never take flight! " 
Then he plunged his sword into the sheath, declaring 
that it should never be put to any meaner use. 

Once more the reigning family was driven out of 
Milan. Two treaties of peace followed this short but 
brilliant campaign; one with the Swiss, who had been 
helping the Milanese, was called the "Perpetual 
Peace," and deserved its name better than many 
others so called, as it continued down to the French 
Revolution, (a period of two hundred and seventy-five 
years); the other, called a " Concordat," was an agree- 
ment with Pope Leo the Tenth, by which Francis 
gave up certain established rights, much to the 



FRANCIS /., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 167 

indignation of the people of France, who saw in 
this a direct attack upon their liberties. But the 
people of France had to get used to having 
their liberties cut off; from this time the laws were 
made accordino- to the will of the kins^ alone, without 
reference to the people's wishes, and they all ended 
with the words, " for such is our good pleasure." 
Taking away the power from the great vassals and 
leaving it with the kino- had made France a united 
and powerful nation; but in the hands of a king not 
wise and good enough to put the people's happiness 
before his own wishes, power became a dangerous 
weapon and led to those frightful abuses which 
brought on the terrible Revolution of 1789. 

When a new emperor was to be elected for Ger- 
many, Francis, Henry the Eighth of England, and 
Charles the First of Spain, all strove for the position, 
and finally Charles, who at nineteen was as crafty as a 
man of fifty, succeeded in obtaining it, and was 
crowned under the name of Charles the Fifth. Francis, 
who had projiosed to Charles that whoever should be 
defeated should bear the disappointment good-humor- 
edly, forgot his fair speeches and hated Charles bitterly 
for his good fortune. The rest of his life was as much 
a lono" duel with his rival as had been that of Charles 
the Bold with his enemy Louis twenty years before. 
This time, however, the characters were reversed; it 
was the King of France, and not his enemy, who was 
rash, headlong and unlucky ; while the Emperor, in 
his patient following out his own plans, and rising up 
stronger after each reverse, reminds us of Louis the 
Eleventh. 



168 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

The first thing to be done, as each party considered, 
was to make friends with Henry the Eighth ; and 
here, as usual, Charles was foremost in the race. While 
Francis was making jDreparations to entertain Henry 
at Calais in a style so splendid as to insure his good- 
will, Charles quietly landed on the English coast with- 
out invitation and made Henry a visit; and so great 
was the effect of the Emperor's eloquence on this occa- 
sion, that when the latter went to his appointed meet- 
ing with Francis, his mind was already made up to 
favor the other side. 

The Field of the Cloth of Gold has been too often 
described in English history to need more than a men- 
tion here. Have we not all before our mind's eye that 
gorgeous encampment near Calais, with its tents cov- 
ered with silk and velvet and golden tissue, its stand- 
ards glittering in the sun, its superb pavilions and 
fountains runnino; with wine? Manv a noble sold his 
forest or his castle to appear with honor in the gilded 
field; and the money expended on the feasts and tour- 
naments that filled up the eighteen days of revelry would 
have kept the court of Louis the Twelfth for a year. 

Francis and Henry were in excellent spirits. They 
laughed and jested with each other, and the King of 
France played some pretty rough practical jokes on his 
brother of England, such as tripping him up at wrest- 
ling, forcing his wa}^ into his tent before he was out of 
bed, and so on; but they parted in good humor, Francis 
feeling that he had shown off very well in the contest 
of luxury, and Henry a little jealous of the superior, 
splendor of the French court to his own, which was 
almost hobnailed by comparison. 



FRANCIS 1., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 169 

And what happened then ? Instead of going directly- 
home to England across Dover Straits, which was his 
nearest way, Brother Henry slipped round to Grave- 
lines, a place in Fiarxders, which was a part of Charles's 
dominions, and there had another private interview 
with the Emperor ! 

The anger of Francis when he learned of his failure 
to gain over the king of England; was intense. He 
instantly declared war against the Emperor, and sent 
an army into Spain, which country Charles had inher- 
ited from his grandfather Ferdinand; and when Charles 
heard of it. he said: "God be praised that lam not the 
one to begin the war; in a little while either I shall 
be a very poor Emperor or he will be a poor King of 
France." It was, indeed, a very poor King of France 
that remained when his wars were over, as we shall 
see. 

The army left in Milan had been composed partly of 
Swiss soldiers, who, being mercenaries, and there- 
fore not entirely under the control of the French, 
clamored constantly for their pay. This not being 
forthcoming, they refused to remain; and the Pope 
and the Emperor having combined their forces to 
drive the French out of Italy, the duchy of Milan 
was lost once more, for the third time within twenty 
years. It was afterwards found out that Louise 
of Savoy, the king's mother, who was one of the 
worst women of her time, had kept for her own use 
the money sent by the king to pay the Swiss soldiers. 
The mischief done to France by this infamous woman 
did not stop with her stealing the soldiers' j^ay. Her 
next victim was the Constable of France, Charles, 



170 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Duke of Bourbon, who was the richest, haughtiest and 
most powerful of all the king's subjects. When his 
wife died, Louise of Savoy, who admired him very 
much, wanted to marry him, and let him know it; he 
refused disdainfully, and from that moment she became 
his most bitter enemy, and induced Francis to take 
such measures against him that he formed the desper- 
ate resolution of going over to the Emperor, and 
did so. 

It was ao^reed that there should be a threefold attack 
upon France, Bourbon invading it from the side of 
Germany, Charles from Spain, and Henry of England 
through Normandy. Besides this, the Duke was to 
have an independent kingdom made for himself out of 
Provence and Dauphiny, and was to marry the 
Emperor's sister, Eleanor. 

Francis, in spite of these adverse circumstances, still 
clung to his darling plan, and again sent an armj'- into 
Italy. After much valuable time had been trifled 
away, a battle was fought, in which the heroic Bayard 
received his death-wound. His troops were flying in 
every direction, but he would not be carried away. 
He made his men place him at the foot of a tree with 
his face to the enemy, and there calmly waited for 
death, which he knew could not be far off. The Duke 
of Bourbon, in hot pursuit of the flying foe, rode up to 
where Bayard lay and said a few words of respect and 
sympathy. " Don't mourn forme," answered Bayard; 
" I die in the discharge of my duty. It is you who are 
to be pitied, for being false to your king, your coun- 
try and your oath." Bourbon retired without a word, 
and in three hours the knight without fear and without 



FBANCIS I., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 171 

reproach, breathed his lasr, honored and lamented 
by friend and foe. 

After this the traitor Bourbon tried to ruin his native 
country by invading* the southern part with an army 
of foreign soldiers; but the Spaniards despised him as 
much as the English are said to have despised Bene- 
dict Arnold in our own Revolution, and did not give 
him any hearty support. They slighted his advice, and 
would not let him carry out his plans; his army made 
an inglorious retreat, and he was forced back into 
Italy almost alone. 

A story is told which shows what the best men in 
Spain thought of him. While he was there, Charles 
the Fifth asked the Marquis de Villena to receive 
Bourbon into his castle as a guest during his stay in 
Madrid. " I can refuse the king nothing," replied the 
Marquis; "but as soon as the traitor is out of the 
house I will set fire to it with my own hand. No man 
of honor could ever live in it again." 

Once more did Francis rush madly into Italy at the 
head of an army, where the memorable battle of Pa via 
put an end for a time to his schemes of ambition. He 
was taken prisoner and carried to Madrid, where 
Charles kept him closely confined for many months. It 
was after this battle that he wrote the well-known let- 
ter to his mother in which he says there is nothing left 
to him but his honor and his life. A long imprisonment 
wore upon his spirits, and he finally signed a treaty 
which did little credit to his " honor." He promised 
to give up to Charles the countries of Burgundy, Flan- 
ders and Artois, to renounce his Italian claims, and to 
restore all the possessions of the Duke of Bourbon. 



172 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

To insure Francis's fulfillment of his part of the treaty, 
his two sons, six and eight years old, were to be sent 
to Spain as hostages. 

In the middle of the river Bidassoa, which for a short 
distance divides France from Spain, a large ship was 
anchored, which had the princes on board. King Fran- 
cis was rowed out to this ship in a small boat; the boys 
knelt down very prettily before their father, who laid 
a hand on the head of each and said, "God bless you, 
my children; " then the little fellows were put into the 
small boat and rowed over to the Spanish side of the 
river, while King Francis was taken to the French 
side. There he found a fine horse standing ready, 
saddled and bridled; he leaped on its back, exclaim- 
ing, "Now I am again a king! " and putting spurs to 
his steed, he rode ofi^ on a full gallop to his own city 
of Bayonne, where his mother and sister were waiting 
for him. 

Humiliating as the agreement was by which Francis 
had gained his freedom, we should think better of 
him if he had kept his word like a man and a gentle- 
man, and performed what he promised. This, how- 
ever, he never meant to do; but pretending that the 
treaty had been signed through compulsion, he utterly 
refused to fulfill it. 

Charles was naturally very angry when he found how 
he had been cheated, calling Francis several uncom- 
plimentary names, like coward and scoundrel, and de- 
manding that if he had any respect for his plighted 
word as a knight and a king he should return and give 
himself up according to promise. Francis paid no 
attention to this summons, but made another so-called 



FRANCIS /., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 173 

" Holy League " with the Pope and Henry the Eighth, 
who were both disgusted with Charles for different 
reasons, and ready to join any thing or any body who 
would help them to injure him. 

So the war went on for some years more, nothing- 
happening of great importance. Francis was given 
up to pleasure and spent his time with worthless favor- 
ites, while his generals were losing ground on every 
side and his sons were still prisoners in Madrid. Bour- 
bon was killed while leading his army against the city 
of Rome, and at length, after much useless bloodshed, 
Charles and Francis agreed to make peace. As neither 
of them cared to meet face to face again, the Emperor 
sent his aunt, Margaret of Austria,^ and Francis sent 
his mother, Louise, to Cambrai, and there these two 
clever women got up an agreement which was called 
" The Ladies' Peace," which answered its purpose 
quite as well as a Gentlemen's Peace would have done, 
if not better. Charles agreed to take two millions of 
crowns instead of Burgundy; Francis, (whose queen 
had died before the battle of Pavia), was to marry the 
Emperor's sister Eleanor, and the little princes, after 
four years of captivity, were to return to their native 
land. In addition to this, Francis was once more to 
renounce all claim to Italy, and give up Flanders and 
Artois to the Emperor. 

We can not relate all the moves of the long game 
played by these two unprincipled men. In a few years 
Francis again invades Italy to get back Milan ; Charles, 
furious at the breach of faith, and vowing that he will 
bring the King of France as low as the poorest gentle- 
man in his dominions, marches with an army into 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



Provence; that beautiful country is laid waste ; the 
inhabitants die or retreat to the mountains; then on 
the other hand, famine thins out the ranks of the 
Spanish soldiers, and Charles gets back into' his own 
country with about half the numbers he started with. 
At last the Pope offers to mediate between the angry 
sovereigns, and succeeded so well that Charles makes 
a visit to Francis, as he crosses France from the Pyr- 
enees to Flanders. 

It was during this visit of the Emperor Charles that 
the court-jester remarked to Francis that he had made 
a list of all the fools in France, and had written the 
Emperor's name at the head of it. "And what should 
you say " inquired the king, " if I should let him get 
away safely?" "I should rub out his name and put 
yours in its place," was the reply. 

We fancy that Francis felt somewhat tempted, but 
if so he resisted the temptation, and Charles arrived at 
his own dominions in safety. As soon as he was fairly 
out of the country however, the French king was angry 
with himself for letting all the generosity be on his 
side, and began making new plans for war. His next 
step was a strange one for the descendant of St. Louis. 
He cared so much more for hurting Charles than he 
did for the Christian religion that he formed a friend- 
ship with the Turkish Sultan, and actually sent a fleet 
to join him in invading Italy. The lilies of France 
and the crescent of the infidel floated side by side from 
the mast-heads of their ships, and the pirate Barba- 
rossa carried back with him to Constantinople fourteen 
thousand Christian slaves, taken in this joint enter- 
prise. 



FRANCIS /., KING OF THE GENTLEMEN. 175 

The later years of Francis were disgraced by cruel 
persecutions of the Protestants. He seemed possessed 
of that strano-e idea so common anionic wicked men in 
those times, that he could atone for his own sins by 
burning heretics and subjecting them to the most cruel 
tortures. He did not repent of his wasteful wars or 
his falsehoods, for those he thoug-ht belono^ed to his 
office as a king; but his private life had been as bad as 
it could be, and the diseases brought on by his own 
dissipation soured his temper and made him delight in 
the pain felt by others. The joyous spirits of the 
youth of twenty had long since gone. At fifty there 
was left a morose old man, worn out before his time, 
who sent out his orders to hano; and burn human be- 
injxs with as much indifference as he would have crushed 
a mosquito, and, unhappily, there were but too many 
agents ready and glad to execute those orders. 

It is pleasant to be able to turn from the gloomy 
side of this picture to the advancement made at this 
time in literature and art. Francis was fond of having 
celebrated men about him, and invited the old Italian 
painter, Leonardo da Vinci, to live at his court. 
The sculptor Benvenuto Cellini also spent several 
years in France, though, if we are to believe his own 
report, Francis paid him more in promises of patronage 
than in ffood ii^old coin. Men of intellect and learnino- 
were welcomed by him, though his own chosen com- 
panions were very different people. 

The beautiful palaces of Fontainebleau and Saint 
Germain, beside many smaller chateaux, still bear, 
witness to his taste in architecture and the vast sums 
he spent upon it. He founded a great institution 



176 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

called the Royal College, where people could be in- 
structed without cost to themselves; and his general 
patronage of learning and art gave him the title of 
"Father of Letters and the Arts." The first half of 
the sixteenth century is called the JRenaissance^ or new 
birth of cultivation. 




CHAPTER XIX. 

he:n'rt II. FRANCIS II. — 1547-1560. 

T is sometimes asked: " Why do you make 
the history of a country only a biography of 
the lives of its kings ? " In writing of France 
it is difficult to do anything else, for there was scarcely 
any national life separate from that of the king. 
Though there might be thousands wiser, better, more 
able than he, the principle of loyalty in the hearts of 
the French continued so strong that it is only after 
many centuries of misgovern ment that we find them 
waking up to the idea that there is one thing in the 
world better than even a good king, and that is, no 
king at all, only a just government founded on the 
people's will. 

If the only thing necessary to make a good king 
were personal courage, and skill in riding on horse- 
back, throwing lances and playing at tennis, Henry 
the Second would have been an excellent one; but 
if prudence, good judgment, and a desire for the wel- 
fare of his people are required in addition, we must 



HENRY II. FRANCIS II. 177 

own that he made a great failure. His father, Francis 
the First, in dying, had cautioned him especially about 
three things. He begged of him to lessen the taxes, 
not to recall the constable Montmorenci, who had been 
banished, and to beware of the family of Guise, who 
were already too powerful and too ambitious to be safe 
sul)jects for a weak king. So Henry immediately sent 
for Montmorenci, and almost the first service he em- 
ployed him in was to punish most cruelly a rebellion 
against an odious tax which pressed heavily on the 
people; such was his way of carrjnng out his father's in- 
structions. The Guise family were soon in high favor, 
and the foresight of Francis proved to have been in vain. 

The tax spoken of was one on salt, called the gabelle, 
first imposed by Philip of Valois. It was always hate- 
ful to the French people because it made one of the 
necessaries of life harder for the poor to buy. In these 
days taxes are, or ought to be, laid mostly upon luxu- 
ries, things which poor people can do without, and 
which the rich can afford to pay for; but that idea had 
not even bsen thouo-ht of three hundred years asfo. 
A poor man eats as much salt as a rich man, so salt was 
taxed. 

Henry was like his father in being very fond of 
pleasure, and in choosing to have a set of court favor- 
ites about him, which included some very bad women. 
The most noted of these was one called Diana of 
Poitiers, who was fully twenty years older than him- 
self, and had been also a favorite of his father's. For 
her sake he neglected his wife, Catherine de' Medici,* 

*De' is a contraction of the Italian del, meaning *' of the," the 
Medici being a renowned Italian family. 
12 



178 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

who made ujd for this after his death by taking the 
government on herself in the reigns of he*r three sons. 

It was not long before Henry was at war with his 
father's old enemy, Charles the Fifth, who besieged 
the fortress of Metz, which was gallantly defended by 
the Duke of Guise. The Emperor had boasted that he 
meant "to attack the place in such style as to knock 
it about Mr. Guise's ears," and had sworn never to give 
up until it was won; but the defence was so obstinate 
that he broke his oath, and saying in a dismal way that 
" Fortune, like the rest of her sex, favored the young 
and slighted the old," went home very much mortified 
and diso-usted. 

Not lono; after this he retired from the world alto- 
gether, leaving his country and his quarrels to his 
son, Philip the Second, who soon had an opportunity 
of retrievino- his father's diso;race at Metz. The battle 
of St. Quentin, fought by his generals, was a glorious 
victory for the Spaniards and an equally humiliating 
defeat for the French, whose commander, Montmo- 
renci, was taken prisoner in the action. 

The Duke of Guise was now made Lieutenant- 
General of the Kingdom, and looking about for some- 
thing to do, he spied the town of Calais, which had 
been in the possession of the English for more than two 
hundred years. Philip of Spain, the husband of the 
Queen of England, had persuaded her to join him in 
the war against France, and Calais was therefore a fair 
point of attack. 

This place was of such immense strength that it had 
taken Edward the Third eleven months of hard work , 
to conquer it; the Duke of Guise retook it in just eight 



HENRY II. FRANCIS II. 179 

days! You can imagine the rage of the English, and 
the despair of Queen Mary, through whose folly the 
loss had taken place. She declared that when she 
died the word "Calais" would be found graven on 
her heart. No wonder the Duke of Guise should 
have been thought the greatest man in France. The 
national pride which he had flattered so strongly made 
him its idol, and the marriage of his niece, Mary, 
Queen of Scots, to the Dauphin, which took place in 
the same year, added, if possible, to his power and 
influence. Nothing of importance was done without 
consulting him, and his family were advanced to the 
highest positions of honor. 

Philip the Second, finding that he could get no more 
help from England, decided to make peace, and a 
treaty was signed at Cateau-Cambresis, which was 
highly advantageous to him. To cement this peace, a 
marriage was agreed upon between Philip (Queen 
Mary of England being dead) and Henry's daughter, 
Elizabeth; and at the same time that this wedding was 
celebrated,. Henry's sister. Marguerite, was married to 
the Duke of Savoy, a great general, who had com- 
manded Philip's armies at the battle of St. Quentin. 
King Henry was extravagantly fond of tournaments, 
at which he always made a good figure, being very 
skillful with the lance; so a remarkably splendid one 
was held on this occasion. The Kino; havino; run sev- 
eral courses with difi'erent knights, who took care to 
give him the advantage, challenged a Scottish lord in 
his service, the Count of Montgomery, to run a tilt 
with him. The Count was extremely unwilling, but the 
King insisted, and the soldier was obliged to comply. 



180 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

When they met, riding at full speed toward each 
other, the Scotchman's lance broke against the king's 
helmet, and a splinter from it went into his eye. He 
fell back senseless, for the wood had penetrated to his 
brain; and after lingering for eleven days in great 
suffering, but unconscious, he died, little regretted by 
anyone. 

Though we have said nothino; about the Reforma- 
tion during the reign of Henry the Second, it must 
not be thought that the interest in it was dying out. 
On the contrary, in spite of the hangings and burnings 
and persecutions of every sort, the number of Protest- 
ants grew day by day, and embraced some of the chief 
men in the kino-dom. The hio-hest in rank amona* 
these was Antony de Bourbon, a descendant of St. 
Louis, who had become king of Navarre by marrying 
the queen of that countr\^, Jeanne d'Albret, who was 
a niece of Francis the First. Encouraged by the 
support of such men, the Reformers became bolder 
and began to hold their meetings publicly, and to sing- 
psalms as they marched through the streets. When 
the treaty of Cateau-Carabresis was made, two Cardi- 
nals who assisted at it added' a secret article promising 
that the kings of France and Spain should unite in 
putting down this heresy by every possible means; 
and as we know what means were possible to such men, 
we are not surprised to hear that they became hard- 
ened in cruelty and taxed their ingenuity to invent 
things that would cause greater suffering. During the 
later years of Francis the First, the old fashion of 
burning at the stake, dreadful as it was, did not satisfy 
the persecutors. They had an arrangement by which 



HENRY II. FRANCIS II. 181 

the people burned were let down into the fire and then 
drawn up again, burning a little each time, but not 
enough to destroy life until it had been repeated many 
times. In the time of Henry his son there was not 
even the relief of being taken away, but the victims 
were suspended at some distance above the fire, and 
there slowly roasted to death for several hours. 

Of course it was only the poorer offenders who 
suffered in this way; the great were beyond the reach 
of the persecutors; but we should not expect that 
such a body of people would long go on suffering 
the helpless ones among them to be tortured and 
killed on account of their relicrion. Before lono- 
the Protestants became a political as well as a relig- 
ious party, and France was plunged into all the horrors 
of a civil war. 

Henry the Second left four sons, of whom three, 
Francis the Second, Charles the Ninth and Henry the 
Third, became in succession kino:s of France. There 
is scarcely anything pleasant to tell about the seven- 
teen months' reign of Francis the Second. At the 
time of his father's death there were two great parties 
getting ready to give one another hard knocks wlien 
the rifrlit time came. These were the Catholics, 
with tlie Duke of Guise at their head, and the Protest- 
ant Reformers, Avhose leaders were the King of 
Navarre and his brother the Prince of Conde. From 
this time we often hear the Reformers spoken of as 
Huo'uenots. The meanino- of this word has not come 
down to us, but it is believed to have come from a Ger- 
man one, meaning, " Bound together by oath." 

Francis the Second was a feeble youth of sixteen, 



182 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

entirely governed by his young wife, the fascinating 
Mary, Qaeen of Scots. She in her turn did precisely 
what her uncles, the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal 
of Lorraine, told her to do. There was one thino- in 
which all these worthy Roman Catholics agreed, which 
was that there was nothing: in the world so delio-htfnl 
as the destruction of heretics. It seemed as if the sole 
business of the rulers was to get rid of these dreadfnl 
pests as fast as possible, and the more cruelly the 
better. So, neglecting everything else, they began 
to persecute. A special court was organized which 
the people called "the burning chamber," because 
almost its only business was to condemn heretics 
to the flames. The young king was made to pass a 
law orderino- that all houses where the Reformed 
worship was known to take place, should be pulled 
down. The good work went bravely on — such work 
as brings tears to our eyes even now, after three hun- 
dred years have passed away. 

After a while these dreadful deeds began to shock 
the better class of people, whether they were Protes- 
tants or not, and the haughtiness of the Guises disgust- 
ed even those who saw nothing wrong in their perse- 
cutions. The frightful extravagance of the court-people, 
who were in the habit of buying everything they 
wanted but not paying for it, created discontent 
among tradesmen, and the palace itself was crowded 
with those who came to beg that the king and queen 
would pay for the fine things they had ordered and 
were using. 

Royalty could not endure an insult like this, and 
the Cardinal of Lorraine wrote an order, which he 



HENRY II. FRANCIS II. 183 

caused the king' to sign, that any one who dared to 
present a bill or ask for the payment of a debt, should 
go away or be hanged. To show that he meant what 
he said, the Cardinal had a very high gallows set up 
close to the palace of Fontainebleau, wdiere the King 
was holdino; his court at that time. 

This was too much even for people who were used 
to tyranny, and some of the creditors who were 
thus cheated out of their money applied secretly to 
the Huguenots to help them. A party was formed of 
the various classes who had causes of complaint, and, 
as usual in France when things went wrong, there 
was a loud cry for the States-General — the National 
Legislature. 

" States-General, indeed !" answered the court 
party. " Do you want to make slaves of us? " Catherine 
de' Medici wrote to her son-in-law, Philip of Spain, 
that " these people wanted to reduce her to the condi- 
tion of a maid-of-all-work by means of the said States." 
So the estates were not assembled, the royal family 
and the courtiers were relieved from the degrading 
necessity of paying their debts, and the vulgar tyrants 
who had desired it were told to go about their business. 

Finding that peaceable means did not succeed, 
some of the discontented formed a plot against the 
government called the " Conspiracy of Amboise." 
This was discovered, and then began the horrible 
work of punishment. For a month there was nothing 
heard of but hanofino;-. burning, drownino- and torturing. 
It became a kind of festival for the court, and other 
amusements were put off that the lords and ladies 
might enjoy the hideous spectacles. Stakes, gibbets, 



184 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

and other instruments of suffering, were erected in 
front of the windows of the banqueting-hall, and 
after dinner the executions took place while the com- 
pany crowded the windows and balconies to get a good 
view. Rows of hooks were fastened high up on the 
palace wall, and on these the bodies were hung for 
days together, to be in sight of every one, — to gratify 
the revenge of the triumphant party and strike terror 
into the hearts of the defeated. 

How lono: these horrible scenes mio-ht have srone on 
it is difficult to say, but just as the Catholic party had 
got the King of Navarre and the Pjince of Conde into 
their hands, King Francis died quite suddenly, and the 
Bourbons were spared. The King of Navarre prom- 
ised not to claim the regency, and Conde, who had 
been condemned to death, was set free. Catherine, 
the Queen-Mother, took the occasion of her son's death 
to have herself appointed regent for his brother, Charles 
the Ninth, who was only ten years old. She made 
friends of the Huguenot leaders by giving them some- 
thing to do in the srovernment, and called the States- 
General together, allowing them to make some very 
wise laws, among which was one that no more people 
should be persecuted for their religion. 

It seemed at last as if poor, distracted France was 
about to enjoy a little peace, but bigotry on one side 
and fanatic-sm on the other made this impossible. The 
Catholic party called the Queen a traitor to her relig- 
ion, because she wanted the heretics let alone; the 
Huguenots, as soon as they found themselves free to 
worship as they pleased, began to interfere with other 
people's ways of worship, and went about destroying 



HENRY II. FRANCIS 11. 185 

tlie images in the cluirclios, knocking down the crosses, 
aud profaning such things as their enemies considered 
most sacred. When suoli folly as this was practised, 
you need not be surprised that the result was a general 
war. 

The first outbreak was at the town of Vassy. The 
Duke of Guise, with a troop of me)i-at-arins at his back, 
halted at this place one Sunday, and, as he passed by a 
barn, heard a Hu<>'uehot conn;rei>ation there at their 
devotions. The soldiers attacked the worshippers and 
tried to disperse them. They defended themselves by 
throwing stones, one of which hit the Duke on the 
cheek. At this the soldiers became furious, and fired 
upon the Huguenots, killing sixty and wounding nearly 
two hundred more. This is called " The Massacre of 
Vassy," and was the beginning of a civil war which 
lastetl more than thirty years. 

Without going into all the particulars of the long 
struggle that followed, you should know what became 
of some of the early leaders in the strife. The King 
of Navarre, Antony de Bourbon, a weak creature who 
had been persuaded to go over to the Catholic side, 
was killed at the siege of Rouen. It is said that before 
he died he turned once more, and declared himself a 
Protestant. The Duke of Guise was waylaid and shot 
while ridino' about on horseback durinix the sicire of 
Orleans, and the Prince of Cond(5, being taken prisoner 
at the battle of Jarnac, was murdered in cold blood 
after he had surrendered. 

B\it though the leaders were gone, each left a son to 
represent him in the contest that was yet to come. 
These were Henry of Navarre, son of Antony, Henry 



186 HISTOEY OF FRANCE. 

oi' r>oiirboii, son of the ri-inco oi" Coiido, wlio took his 
fathoi-V title, ami lloiirv o( Guise, who became Duke 
upon his father's tk^ith. To these may be added Henry 
of N'alois, who was next brother of King- Charles the 
Nintli, and afterward sueceeded him on the throne. 




CHAPTER XX, 

CHARLES IX. HENRY 111, 151)0-1580. 

OR a time after the events already mentioned, 
there was a hill in t he storm. Charles the Ninth, 
always inconstant and unsteady, seemed to be 
turnino- towards the side of the Huguenots. He permit- 
ted tliem the free exercise of their relig-ion: he souiiht 
the friendship of Protestant sovereigns, and encouraged 
his brother, Henry of Anjou, to pay his addresses to 
Queen Elizabeth of Eno-land. More than this, he 
otVei'cd the hand of his youngest sister, Marguerite, to 
Henry o( Navarre, and showed great lavor to the 
Admiral Coligny, one of the most distinguished Hugue- 
not leaders. 

It is dldiciilt to tell at what time the idea of that 
frightful massacre known as "St. Bartholomew," 
entercil the mind of Catherine de' Medici. Some per- 
sons think that she planned it several years before it 
took place, at an interview with tlie Duke of Alva, 
Philip the Second's persecuting general. Othere insii^t 
that it was a sudden resolve, suggested by her hatreu 
of Admiral Coiignv; but all a^Tce that it was her work. 



CHARLES IX. HENRY III. 187 

Of nil the wicked women history speaks of, none have 
been more false, more cruel, or more deadly in their 
hatreds. Any one who stood in the way of her ambi- 
tion, or had excited her anger, was sure to disappear 
from the scene, and her revenge was the more deadly 
because it was always masked under a smile. 

A very different woman from Catherine was Jeanne 
d''Albret, mother of Henry of Navarre. From the 
time he was born she took the whole charo-e of his edu- 
cation upon herself, and did her best to make him 
brave, truthful and patriotic. She was very much 
afraid that he would be led away by the bad men and 
women about Charles's court, but when an invitation 
came for him to marry the beautiful princess Margaret, 
she consented, thinking that perhaps this might bring- 
about a peace between the Catholics and Protestants. 
So they went together to Paris, all the bells rang for 
joy, and great preparations were made for the festivi- 
ties. 

A wedding ought to be a very gay affair, everybody 
having anything to do with it feeling happy and con- 
tented; but the marriage of Henry of Navarre- and 
Marguerite of Valois was not one of that sort. The 
Catholics were enraged that the King's sister should 
be given to a heretic; the Protestants dreaded to have 
their chief entangled with a family so false and treach- 
erous that their caresses were generally the prelude to 
some deadly mischief. All was anger and confusion. 

The Queen of Navarre, who had come to Paris to 
al^nd her son's wedding, died suddenly in the midst 
of the preparations. At the time there was but 
one explanation — poison! Catherine de' Medici had 



188 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



presented her with a pair of gloves prepared expressly by 
the court perfumer, (whom the people called in private 
" The Queen's Poisoner,") and it was taken for granted 
that the unseen death was conveyed in them. How 
much truth there was in this notion we cannot now 
decide; but it threw a gloom over the Huguenots that 
not all the gorgeous wedding-finery could drive away. 

The marriage took place in front of the great Cathe- 
dral of Notre Dame, where a platform was built, and 
the ceremony was performed in the open air. Nobody 
had asked Marguerite whether she wanted to be mar- 
ried or not, and it happened she did not, at least to this 
particular bridegroom; and when she was asked if she 
would have this man for her wedded husband she made 
no answer. Her brother. King Charles, who stood by 
her, noticed this; and as it would never have done to 
have the performance stop there, he pushed her head 
down rather roughly with his hand, to make it appear 
that she nodded assent. Afterward she went into the 
church to hear mass, while Henry and his friends 
walked about outside until it was finished. 

While everything was going on to make the Hugue- 
nots feel perfectly secure, the Queen-Mother was hold- 
ino; dark conferences with her ministers and with her 
favorite son, Henry of Anjou. He was just as wicked 
as herself, though much weaker; and she could talk 
with him about things that poor unsteady Charles was 
afraid to hear. 

Among them all they planned to have every Hugue- 
not in Paris, and as many as possible in the rest of 
France, killed in one night. The twenty-fourth of 
August, which is known as St. Bartholomew's day, 



CHARLES IX. HENRY HI. 189 

was the one selected. It was just six days after the 
wedding, and the city was still full of Protestants 
who had come to have their share of the gayety. For 
some reason not now understood, Catherine could not 
wait for the general massacre to dispose of the 
Admiral Coligny, but hired an assassin to shoot him 
as he was walking along the street. The ball only 
took off some finsrers and lodo-ed in his arm. He 
quietly pointed out the house from which the shot 
came, went home and sent for the king. Charles was 
nearly distracted. His mother had worked upon all 
his worst passions until he had learned to feel pleas- 
ure in what was evil, but he was drawn towards the 
Admiral by sincere admiration and respect. He did 
not know what to do. He blustered a little, assured his 
friend of his love and sympathy'-, swore to take a ter- 
rible revenge for the act — and then went home to be 
bullied by his mother into signing the order for the 
massacre of St. Bartholemew. 

It was not without a fearful struo-g-le with himself 
that the weak young man yielded. He would have 
been fflad to a:et out of it altoo;ether and leave the 
responsibility to others; but this could not be. His 
royal hand and seal were needed as a warrant for the 
deed of shame. When the friends who surrounded 
him had at last wruno- from him an unwillino- con- 
sent, he became desperate, and exclaimed, "Kill 
them all! Let not one live to reproach me!" 

On the twenty-fourth of August, in the year 1572, 
the great bell of a church called St. Germain I'Auxer- 
rois rung out at two hours after midnight. All was 
ready. Every steeple in the capital instantly repeated 



190 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the signal; lights streamed out from the windows, and 
the assassins set forth, armed to the teeth for the 
attack. They wore white crosses in their hats and a 
white scarf on the left arm, that they might not by 
mistake kill each other. They did not mean that one 
Protestant should be left alive that night in Paris. 

The Admiral Ooligny was the first to die. The 
Duke of Guise, to make sure of him, went himself to 
his house and sent up a servant to murder the old man 
in. his bed. Guise remained in the street until the 
body was thrown down to him. Then he turned it 
over with his foot to see if it were really his hated 
enemy, and, being satisfied, went off to carry on the 
work elsewhere. 

The streets were soon filled with the flying Hugue- 
nots, and the whole city became a scene of the wildest 
excitement. The queen and her attendants watched 
it from the palace windows; the king, maddened by 
the sight, stood on a balcony and fired on the wretched 
fugitives as they ran. He appeared like a madman; 
it seemed that, like the tiger, having once tasted blood 
he could not be satisfied. All the Huo-nenot servants 
about the court were slaughtered with the rest, except 
Charles's old nurse and his physician, whom he saved. 
The King of Navarre and his cousin, the Prince of 
Conde, in order to save their lives professed to give 
up their religion. They promised to become Catho- 
lics, and, as long as they remained in Paris, attended 
mass and went throuo-h the outward forms of that 
religion. After many months they succeeded in mak- 
ing their escape, and were then again Protestants as 
before. 



CHARLES IX. HENRY III. 191 

It was not in Paris alone that such scenes were 
witnessed. All through France an effort was made to 
make thorough work of the heretics, and immense 
numbers were killed in the large cities. The most 
moderate historians estimate the whole number at 
from twenty-five to thirty thousand. 

Charles was now anxious to justify this odious 
crime in the eyes of the world, so he called his parlia- 
ment together and proceeded to hold a " bed of justice"* 
about it. The members were base enou2:h to flatter him 
with praises of his prompt action against such dangerous 
enemies; whereupon he sent round messengers with 
the ncAvs to his brother kings and queens. Elizabeth 
of England was so angry that she would scarcely treat 
with civility the ambassador who was sent to apologize 
for the massacre. The princes of Germany, both 
Protestant and Catholic, shuddered with horror. The 
Pope, (that wise Gregory the Thirteenth who gave us 
the calendar by which we still count our days and 
years,) wept in private over the dreadful story, though he 
thought it necessary to order a public thanksgiving on 
the occasion. Nobody really enjoyed hearing of it but 
the grim Philip the Second of Spain, who considered 
it one of the greatest blessings ever vouchsafed by 
Heaven to a sinful world. 

Charles the Ninth was not happy. A bloody spectre 
seemed to pursue him wherever he went. He had 
wild, disturbed dreams and anxious waking hours. 

*This was the ceremony by which the French Kings required 
the Parliaments to register their edicts, and was so called origi- 
nally from the circumstance of the King's reclining on a couch 
while the court was receiving his commands. 



192 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

He tried by violent exertion to work off the fever that 
was devotiring him, and would ride furiously till he 
dropped from his horse exhausted, or blow the horn 
till his lungs were worn out. He had a forge set up 
for himself and worked at it like a blacksmith; nothing 
but bodily effort seemed to allay the restlessness of 
his mind. 

As his life drew near its close, the old visions came 
to him again. He had no rest from the dreadful 
thoughts that haunted him day and night. His bed- 
clothes were often found soaked with blood, a natural 
consequence of hemorrhages from the lungs, but which 
the ignorant people of that time thought must come 
either from poison or magic. He died at twenty-four 
years of age. 

Charles left no children, and the throne now passed 
to his younger brother, Henry, Duke of Anjou, who 
had been made king of Poland, and was living in that 
country. Catherine sent for him to return at once, 
which he did, very much to the disgust of the Poles, 
who had to look up another king. It was nearly three 
months, however, before his anxious subjects caught 
sight of him, so much was he taken up by festivities at 
the cities he stopped at on the way. When he came, 
the French people were disappointed to find that he 
cared nothing about governing, and preferred to pass 
his time in rowing about on the river in a little painted 
boat, or playing witli a basketful of puppies, which he 
carried about* sluno- round his neck. 

At the battles of Jarnac and Moncontour, where 
the Huguenots were defeated, he had shown some 
courage, and the people imagined they had in him a 



CHARLES IX. HENRY III. 193 

warlike king like Francis the First; but his bravery 
had all oozed out, and there was nothing left but a 
poor creature who thought it fine sport to go to balls 
dressed like a woman, or sing low songs and play low 
antics among a set of companions as degraded as him- 
self. He never appeared on horseback, but, when the 
fancy happened to take him, might be seen walking 
barefoot through the streets in a dress of sackcloth, 
together with a company of his chosen companions, all 
with whips in their hands, with which to lash one 
another in the churches for their sins. These com- 
rades, whom he called "mignons,"or darlings, were 
the vilest young men who could be found in Paris, dis- 
tinguished only for their wickedness. 

When Henry of Navarre escaped from Paris, which 
he did about two years after the great massacre, the 
Huguenots gathered around him and took up arms 
again. They were so sti-ong that Catherine and the 
king thought it prudent once more to promise 
them that they should be allowed perfect free- 
dom of worship. This enraged the Guise party, who 
thouo-ht it would have been better for the kino- to jrive 
up his crown than to make peace with heretics. A 
powerful party called the League was formed for the 
purpose of opposing these measures, and soon became 
the strono;est in the kinsfdom. The fact that the Pro- 
testant Henry of Navarre, who was descended from 
one of the sons of St. Louis, was heir to the throne in 
case Henry the Third should die without children, 
added an intense bitterness to the contest, and the 
Leaguers were determined to fight it out to the end. 

The poor, weak King now declared himself head of 
o 



194 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the League, thinking that he might in this way gain a 
little peace, but the intrigues of his enemies left him 
no rest. Soon after this the battle of Coutras was 
gained by Henry of Navarre, who showed himself to be 
not only ?L brave soldier, but a skillful general and a 
merciful victor. "Spare my Frenchmen!" he cried to 
his soldiers when the battle had been won. "No 
more blood!" And when he found his supper-table 
set in the room where the dead body of Joyeuse, the 
Royalist commander, was laid out, he had the supper 
removed to another room, and checked the noisy 
gayety of his officers, who were making merry in the 
presence of death. " Gentlemen," said he, "it seems 
to me this is a time for grief, even to the conquerors." 
His own loss, owing to his good generalship, was only 
about forty men; that of his enemies twenty-five 
hundred. 

And where was Henry the Third all this time? He 
was not at the battle, being at a distance with another 
division of his army; and after it we hear of him at 
the city of Lyons, employed in a way which I will use 
the words of De Thou, the best historian of that time, 
to describe. 

"As unconcerned as if his kingdom were enjoying 
perfect peace, he took to collecting little dogs. Every- 
body was surprised to see the King of France, in the 
midst of so terrible a war and in extreme want of 
money, expending upon such pleasures all his time 
and all the money he could scrajje together. * * * 
Without counting hunting-dogs and birds, which are 
always a great expense in the households of kings, it 
cost him every year more than a hundred thousand 



CHARLES IX. HENRY III. 195 

gold crowns for these little Lyonnese clogs; and he 
maintained at his court, with large salaries, a multi- 
tude of men and women who had nothing to do but to 

feed them." 

No wonder that the Duchess of Montpensier, sister 

of the Duke of Guise, carried about a pair of golden 
scissors at her srirdle, boastinor that with them she would 
give Brother Henry a third crown. He had already 
worn those of France and Poland; she meant that she 
would shave his head and make him a monk, after the 
fashion of the old Merovino-ian times when a kino^ was 
proved unworthy of his throne. 

We next find King Henry back at Paris. The Duke 
of Guise had been forbidden by him to come to that 
city, but as the Duke of Guise cared nothing whatever 
for King Henry's orders, he came nevertheless. The 
populace were wild with joy, the king angry and help- 
less. He sent for such of his soldiers as were wnthin 
reach, and they entered Paris by night, hoping to take 
the Leaguers by surprise, but the latter were prepared 
for them. They had barricades, made of paving-stones, 
carts and barrels, thrown up in the principal streets, 
and chains drawn across the entrances ; the houses 
were fortified as far as possible, and all the citizens 
armed. The king's troops were attacked and forced 
to surrender; the whole town was in a state of the 
wildest confusion, and Henry at last sent a humble 
message to the Duke, begging him to put a stop to the 
fearful carnage that was going on in the streets. 

The Duke played his part admirably. He had kept 
quietly at home, letting others do the fighting and take 
the blame; now he rode out among the furious mob, 



195 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

unarmed and with nothing but a riding-whip in his 
hand, and the tumult ceased at once. The rao-in^r 
multitude were quieted as if by magic; the streets 
were cleared, and in a few hours all was peace. This 
is known in history as the Day of the Barricades. 

Burning with rage and shame at finding himself 
thus at the mercy of his own subject, Henry resolved 
on a cowardly crime that should free him forever from 
this hated control. He armed nine of his own attend- 
ants with dao-o-ers with which to take the Duke's life, 
and stationed them in an ante-chamber leading to his 
own room. He then sent for Guise to come to him, 
and as the Duke was raising the portiere which covered 
the door, the assassins fell upon him and stabbed him 
to death. His immense strength enabled him to drag 
himself across the room even after they had struck him 
down, and ho fell dead at the foot of the king's bed. 

Henry came out from a closet where he had been 
waiting, and after making himself quite sure that there 
was no life left in the majestic figure, kicked it to have 
a last revenge. Then he went to his mother's room, 
full of glee. " I feel much better to-day," he said. " I 
am King of France again; the king of Paris is dead." 
" God grant that you may not prove to be king of 
nothing at all," answered the more prudent Catherine, 
whom he had not consulted about the murder. "I 
hope the cutting is right; now for the sewing." 

The sewing did not turn out well at all. If Henry 
hoped by the death of his rival to have a time of quiet 
in which to enjoy the society of his dogs and his mon- 
keys, he was bitterly mistaken. The Duke had left no 
son old enough to take up his quarrel, but his brothers 



CHARLES IX. HENRY III. 197 

were now all-powerful, and a howl of execration went 
up from the whole country against the author of this 
detestable crime. He was excommunicated by the 
pope, and bands of people went to the churches to 
pray for his death. Deserted by even his own jDarty, 
the king asked to see his brother-in-law, Henry of 
Navarre, and begged for help. Henry joined him 
very willingly, and they prepared to get together as 
large an army as they could and to besiege Paris, which 
was held by Guise's brother, the Duke of Mayenne. 

Another strange and unexpected turn of Fortune's 
wheel was now to come. Three days before the attack 
on Paris, a young monk named Jacques Clement 
gained admission to the king by meams of a forced 
letter, and while he was reading it, stabbed him in the 
body. Henry snatched the dagger from him and 
struck at him, crying out — "Oh, the wicked monk! 
He has killed me! Kill him! " and the attendants, rush- 
ing in, dispatched Clement with their spears. 

The king lived long enough to receive the sacra- 
ment, declare that he pardoned his enemies, and call 
the nobles around his bedside to take the oath of alle- 
giance to Henry of Navarre. The reason for the mur- 
der was never found out. As the Duke of Guise was 
considered a martyr for the Catholic faith and revered 
as a saint, the monk may have thought he was doino- 
a service well-pleasing to God when he took ven- 
geance on his murderer. On the other hand, many 
persons suspected the Duchess of Montpensier of sug- 
gesting the act, but as nothing could be ascertained, 
the matter was soon forgotten in others of greater im- 
portance. 



198 



HISTORY OF FRANCE, 



This, then, was the end of the family of Yalois, who 
for more than two centuries and a half had occupied 
the throne of France — (1328-1589). An unlucky race 
they had been, their reigns, for the most part, full of 
trouble and disappointment. Yet we must own that 
they left France a much greater and more glorious coun- 
try then the}' found it. They extended its territory and 
made it compact and united, and many of them were 
enlightened patrons of literature and the arts. Their 
failings as a race were a too great love of show and 
magnificence, a heartless grinding down of the poor 
while they loaded the rich with favors, and a general 
practice of despotism — that is, ruling according to 
their own pleasure and by a so-called divine right, 
w^ithout reference to the will' of the people. 



CHAPTER XXI. 




HENRY OF ISTAYAERE. 1589-1610. 

S THE third Henry had died without children, 
Henry of Navarre was now in fact Henry the 
Fourth of France ; but five years of weary 
fighting were to pass before he could even enter his 
own capital. His being so distantly related to the late 
kino- was ao-ainst him — he was only a seventeenth 
cousin or something of that kind — but what was much 
more against him was the fact of his being a Protest- 
ant. A large proportion of the people of France were 



HENRY OF NAVARRE. 199 

still good Catholics, and they could not bear the 
thouo;ht of a heretic kino-. 

Upon Henry's refusal to accept the Catholic faith as 
his own, his soldiers deserted by thousands. Then he 
made an agreement with some of the principal Catho- 
lics promising to protect their religion, and that of- 
fended the Huguenots. Moderation was just what 
neither part}'- desired, so thoy began to fight, and 
Plenry won the battles of Arques and Ivry. At the 
latter he told his soldiers that if their banners went 
down they must follow the white plume ho wore in his 
hat, and it would lead them on to victory. There was a 
victory, and a very glorious one, but it produced no 
great results ; the Leaguers appeard as strong as ever. 
Henry advanced with his army to besiege Paris. He 
closed up all the approaches to the city, so that no 
food could be sent into it except what he chose to 
allow; the people held out with the greatest fortitude, 
though nearl}"- starving; and just as it appeared certain 
that this important place must fall into his hands, 
Philip the Second of Spain sent his nephew, Alexander 
Farnese, to its relief, and Henry was obliged to march 
away. 

The King of Spain, the mighty League and the Pope 
all against him, and only Elizabeth of England on his 
side, giving him some small help in money and troops — 
■what could Henry do? He did not see any way out 
of the struggle. So much were both parties set against 
him that scarcely a sixth part of the people of France 
were with him. The same causes for which the war was 
begun would continue to exist to the end, unless some 
way were found to put a stop to the confusion. To add 



200 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to his difBcultles, arrangements were made to oifer the 
crown of France to Isabella, daughter of Philip of 
Spain and niece of Henry the Third, if she would 
marry a French prince — probably the Duke of Guise. 
To allow this would have been at once to lay down his 
crown, and Henry decided to take what he called "the 
perilous leap." 

He invited some of the most learned doctors of 
divinity that could be found in France to instruct him 
as to the Roman Catholic faith, and having listened to 
their arguments one day from six in the morning until 
noon, he professed himself completely satisfied of the 
truth of what they said. The next Sunday he went in 
great state to St. Denis, where he was received by the 
archbishop, nine bishops and, a great company of other 
clergymen. 

"Who are you?" inquired the archbishop. "The 
King." " What do you wish?" " To be received into 
the bosom of the Roman Catholic church." " Do you 
desire it?" "Yes, I desire it." After this dialogue, 
Henry knelt before the altar and read the profession 
of faith which had been agreed upon; the archbishop 
blessed him and forgave all his sins, and the great roof 
of the Cathedral echoed with cries of " Long live the 
Kino-!"" For the first time in his life he was a king; 
indeed. 

We must not judge Henry too harshly in view of 
this easy change in his faith. He was probably one 
of those people who think one form of religion about 
as good as another if you only live up to it, and had 
never troubled himself to understand the doctrines on 
either side. The Calvinists had treated him with great 



HENRY OF NAVARRE. 201 

harshness, and it was perhaps natural for him to think 
that their severe creed was a mistake. I think we may 
acquit him of the charge of deliberate hypocrisy, and 
rather set him down as a man who had very little reli- 
gion of any kind, but a good deal of patriotism and an 
intelligent love for his country. 

It is hard to describe the character of Henry the 
Fourth without seeming to exaggerate those good 
qualities which have made him the idol of the French 
people from his own day to this. Though he had some 
great faults, they were not such as made his subjects 
unhappy. His first thought was always not "Wlifit can 
I do to make myself glorious?" but "What will be 
best for my people?" 

He had led a hard life for many years. Poor, sus- 
pected, opposed at every turn, he had never known 
the pleasures of prosperity. But misfortune could not 
sour his sunny temper, and trouble made him only the 
more tender-hearted and sympathetic. One of his 
favorite sayings was, "I want every man in my king- 
dom to have a fowl in his pot for Sunday;" which was 
a generous wish at a time when the poor scarcely ever 
tasted meat of any kind. 

Henry started in life with a large share of common 
sense and an overpowering energy. Adversity added 
to these a great power of self-command and an unceas- 
ing watchfulness, so that he was always on the lookout 
for danger, and ready to take advantage of every 
crumb that Fortune threw in his way. And when he 
did brilliant things, like gaining the battle of Ivry, his 
modesty was as remarkable as his jDatience under 
misfortune had been. Ho never took the credit to 



202 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

himself for anything that was accomplished, or boasted 
of the ereat thino-s he meant to do. Just before the 
battle of x\.rques, a prisoner was taken who told him 
of an immense force making ready to attack him. 
"And where is your army?" asked this gentleman, 
looking about him at the scanty forces which were all 
that King Henry had been able to get together. " Oh, 
you don't see them all," answered the King, laughing. 
"You don't reckon the good God and the right, but 
they are always with me." 

Another quality very rare in a king who had met 
with much opposition, was his forgiving temper. He 
could hardly be persuaded to punish even those who 
had ijnured him most seriously. More than once he 
took such people into his service, treated them with 
the utmost confidence, and turned them from enemies 
into devoted friends. When an insurrection broke out, 
instead of sending a marshal to drown it in blood, he 
inquired into the grievances complained of, re- 
dressed them as far as possible, and by his tact and 
kindness changed the rebels into enthusiastic sup- 
porters. 

One more trait should be mentioned before passing 
on to the incidents of Henry's reio;n, and that is his 
perfect sincerity. In the early part of his century an 
Italian called Machiavelli had written a book to show 
that the most important thing for kings and queens to 
learn is hypocrisy. The Machiavellian policy was 
pursued by Philip the Second, by Catherine de' Medici, 
and to some extent by Queen Elizabeth; and a mon- 
arch who meant what he said and always spoke the 
truth was for a long time such a puzzle to the rest 



HENRY OF NAVARRE. 203 

of Europe that it baffled them as much as hypocrisy 
would have done. 

There has seldom been a king more out at elbo^vs 
than was Henry the Fourth at the time of his corona- 
tion. We hear vague whispers of mended clothes 
and patched boots ; and it is stated on very good 
authority that when he received his first ambassadors 
he had to borrow a velvet coat that had belonged to 
the dead king Henry to make a respectable appearance 
in. The Leaguers had melted down the golden crown 
of Charlemagne, which had been kept as a precious 
relic for more than eight hundred years, so a new one 
Avas made for him, with which he was crowned at 
Chartres, Rheims being in possession of the enemy. 
Soon after this the Duke of Mayenne quietly slipped 
away from Paris, and King Henry entered it amidst 
the wildest rejoicings. When the garrison of Spanish 
soldiers marched out of the gates, the king stood by 
and called out gaily, " Good-bye, gentlemen ; my 
compliments to your master, but don't come here 
ao;ain!" 

Henry was very full of fun, and the only punish- 
ment he ever inflicted on Mayenne for his five years 
of stubborn opposition was a good-natured practical 
joke. The Duke was immensely fat and walked very 
little, being too unwieldy to do so with comfort. 
When he visited the king for the first time, the latter 
asked him to take a turn in the grounds with him. As 
it would have been the height of ill-breeding to de- 
cline such an invitation from his sovereign, Mayenne 
complied, and Henry kept him walking about as fast 
as he could for a long time, the poor duke puffing and 



204 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

panting after him, frightfully red in the face, and ready 
to drop from exhaustion. 

When it was plain that he could endure it no longer, 
the king burst out laughing, and exclaimed, " There! 
that's the only punishment you shall have for all the 
trouble you've given me! " The Duke did his best to 
get one knee on the ground, which would have been 
the proper thing to do under the circumstances. He 
couldn't quite accomplish it, but he assured his majesty 
of his gratitude and devotion, and was a faithful sub- 
ject ever after. It was of this Duke that one of the 
popes said, in great disgust, that he spent more 
hours at the dinner-table every day than Henry of 
Navarre did in bed. 

In 1598 a treaty was made with Philip II. of Spain, 
called the Peace of Vervins, which insured tranquility 
in that quarter;- but in the same year a far more impor- 
tant State paper was issued by the king, called the 
Edict of Nantes. This declared that from that time 
onward both Huo^uenots and Catholics should have 
equal rights in regard to the exercise of their religion, 
and that the former should not be shut out from any 
office, honor or dignity on account of their faith. They 
were to have a court especially to protect their inter- 
ests, and once in three years they might hold an assem- 
bly to talk over their condition, and appeal to the king 
to redress any grievances under which they still suf- 
fered. 

Unless we go back to the spirit of that narrow- 
minded century and see what a new thing it was for 
those in power to grant religious privileges to others, 
we shall not understand what a great step was made 



HENRY OF NAVARBE. 205 

in promoting freedom of thought by this act. The 
Catholic party opposed it bitterly, but, as the king 
coolly remarked to his Parliament, who hesitated about 
registering the edict, " My will is reason enough for 
you; when subjects are loyal, kings need give no 
other." A fine sentiment if kings were perfect, and 
which worked very well as long as Henry lived. After- 
wards it bore bitter fruits, as we shall see. 

All enemies, without and within thekin2:dom, beins: 
at last quiet, Henry had full leisure to give attention 
to the condition of his country. Unlike Louis the 
Twelfth, he had no ambition to conquer foreign 
countries; his one object was the happiness and pros- 
perity of his own people. The year which witnessed 
the Peace of Vervins and the Edict of Nantes saw 
France in a state of great misery. In the forty years 
that had passed since the death of Henry the Second, 
eight hundred thousand of her inhabitants had been 
killed and countless homes made desolate, and a vast 
projDortion of those who remained were reduced to 
beggary. 

Agriculture was neglected, the treasury was empty 
and the nation deeply in debt. The most shameless 
stealing of the public revenues had been going on for 
many years, enormous taxes being collected from the 
people which never found their way into the national 
purse, but were kept by the officers and great lords 
who had collected them. Bridges were broken down, 
great tracts of land laid waste, roads neglected and 
overspread by marshes. Commerce had nearly died 
out in the long struggle for existence. All had to be 
beorun over ao;ain. 



206 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

King Henry, one of whose traits was an excellent 
judgment in choosing his ministers, found in the Duke 
of Sully the very man to carry out his ideas. This 
nobleman was at the same time perfectly honest and a 
great financial genius. He got rid of the middle-men 
who devoured the hard earnings of the poor without 
enriching the king, and caused the money to go 
directly into the royal treasury. He abolished great- 
numbers of useless offices, and forbade the nobles 
and governors of provinces to raise taxes on their owa 
account (as they had been in the habit of doing), 
without consent of the King. One nobleman lost 
sixty thousand francs a year out of his income by this 
arrangement. 

As all the money thus gained was expended with 
the strictest economy, the effects soon began to show 
themselves. Roads were made, bridges rebuilt, vast 
tracts of marshy country drained, manufactures en- 
couraged, and grapevines and mulberry trees planted 
by millions. Several grand public buildings were begun 
and others finished or added to at great expense, and 
yet with all this, the public debt was paid, the taxes 
gradually diminished, and a large sum left over in the 
treasury at the king's death. 

It was during the years of peace which followed, 
that some enterprising Frenchmen, under the king's 
liberal patronage, began to make settlements in 
America. Jacques Cartier had sailed up the St. 
Lawrence seventy years before, and various explorers 
had followed him. In 1605 a settlement was made by 
Frenchmen at Port Royal, in Nova Scotia; three years 
afterward the brave Champlain laid the foundation 



HENRY OF NAVARRE. 207 

of Quebec, and later in the century Pere Mar- 
quette visited the spot on which Chicago now stands. 

For a ions* time the kins: had been turnino; over in 
his mind a plan by which all Christian Europe was to 
be joined together in a confederacy against the Turks, 
which confederacy was to be so arranged that no one 
nation should be more powerful than any of the rest. 
In order to carry out this "grand design," as it was 
called, it was necessary first to bring down the pride 
of Austria p,nd Spain, both. of which countries were 
governed by different branches of the same family. 
Henry, who had an immense sum of money laid up in 
his treasury for this very purpose, soon raised a vast 
army and easily found a pretext for invading the 
dominions of his Roman Catholic neighbors. 

Just as he was about to set out on his expedition, 
his queen, who had ever since her marriage been 
clamoring for her own coronation, once more brought 
forward her request, and urged it so persistently 
that Henry was, though unwillingly, induced to grant 
it. The time was inconvenient; he was impatient to 
start for the seat of war; he did not want to spend 
the money needed for such a ceremony; he was not 
very fond of his wife; but he was always weak where 
women were concerned, and after she had worried him 
into consenting he had the thing done in the grandest 
style possible. 

The next day he went to pay a visit to the Duke of 
Sully, who was not very well. He was in low spirits 
and had repeatedly said that he should be killed be- 
fore he could get away. He was riding in a coach — 
a great lumbering vehicle which he always hated — 



^08 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

with six gentlemen of his household and a few out- 
riders, when the procession was stopped by some carts 
in the street. The king happened to be reading a 
letter at the time, and was leaning one arm on the 
shoulder of the person next him. x\t this moment a 
man named Francis Ravaillac stepped upon the carriage 
wheel and plunged a knife twice into the King's breast. 
After the first blow Henry murmured, " It 's nothing," 
in his old fashion; the second cut an artery, and he 
never spoke again. 

Oh, the mourning that there was in France for the 
King's death ! Sully describes the sobbing and cry- 
ing, the groans, the mournful silence, the hands clasped 
and raised to Heaven, that met him as he passed 
through the streets when the news was told. In the 
court, measures were hastily taken to preserve order by 
holding a council and appointing the Queen regent 
for her vouno- son; and in little more than two hours 
after the knife of Ravaillac had entered Henry's heart, 
the new government may be said to have been in ope- 
ration. 

Nobody was able to find out from Ravaillac why he 
had killed the king. He was put to the most cruel 
tortures, but denied to the last that anybody had 
helped him or advised him to do it. It is probable 
that he was a half- crazy Roman Catholic who did not 
approve of Henry's mildness towards the Protestants, 
and thought, like Jacques Clement, that he was doing 
God service in killino^ a wicked sovereign. He was 
put to death with the most horrible cruelty. 

Though Henry the Great had, to all appearance, 
everything that heart could wish, he was an unhappy 



HENRY OF NAVARRE. 209 



man at the time of his death. I have said nothing to you 
yet about his worst fault. The people he liked best to 
be with were women of immoral character, for whose 
society he neglected his wife and his best friends, and 
who for the last few years of his life exercised an almost 
unbounded influence over him. The queen, by such 
means, had lost all affection for him, and is said to have 
rejoiced at his death; the favorites themselves were 
jealous, and each disliked the King for his attentions to 
the others; the courtiers were eno-ao-ed in undio-nified 
squabbles, the natural result of such a state of things; 
and the king, watched and suspected by all, knew not 
where to turn for comfort except to his faithful Sully, 
who never failed him. 

This great, wise, foolish King had one pleasure that 
must have seemed very sweet to him in the midst of 
the discords around him; he was very fond of his chil- 
dren. One day when the stately ambassador from 
Germany came to pay him a visit, he found the King 
on all-fours on the floor, with one of his children on 
his back. The others were playing about the room. 
"Are you a father?" inquiFed Henry, looking up. 
" Yes, Sire." " Then we will finish our game," ans- 
wered the King, and finish it they did, very much to 
the surprise of the dignified minister. 
14 




210 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

LOUIS XIII. 1610—1643. 

jHE new king, Louis the Thirteenth, was a 
spoiled child of nine years old, and had a 
weak, unprincipled mother, who was herself 
o-overned by low favorites, the principal of whom were 
an Italian named Concini and his wife. Sully soon 
found that his advice went for nothing under the new 
management, and retired to the country, and then 
everything slipped back into its old bad way. 

" The age of the kings is past," was a saying among 
the nobles, and they began to tyrannize over the people 
and tax them for their own benefit just as they had 
done before. Concini had been made prime minister 
and afterward marshal. It is remarked by a brilliant 
modern writer that as long as he continued to share 
with the nobles the money left in the king's coifers by 
Sully, they submitted quite tamely to his walking over 
them; but when the treasury was empty they suddenly 
discovered that a low-born Italian had no right to rule 
France, and began to lay plans to destroy him. 

The queen-mother was a bigoted Roman Catholic, 
and the main object of her policy was to keep on 
friendly terms with Spain. To this end a double mar- 
riage was arranged. Her daughter Elizabeth, (which 
is the same name as the Spanish Isabella), was to 
marry the son of Philip the Third, and her son Louis 
was to take for his bride Philip's daughter, Anne of 
Austria. Again the river Bidassoa, the dividing-line 



LOUIS XIII. 211 



between France and Spain, was the meeting-place for 
the representatives of royalty. On the little Isle of 
Pheasants, in the middle of the river, the young girls 
met and exchanged greetings. Then Anne went to 
Bordeaux, in France, where she met her future hus- 
band, and Elizabeth to Burgos, in Spain, where she 
was married to the Prince of Asturias, afterward Philip 
the Fourth. 

When Louis was thirteen years old, he was declared 
of age to govern for himself. The Queen-mother went 
throuo-h the form of callino; the States-General to- 
gether, but the attempt only showed how useless it 
was to hope for any thing from such an assembly. 
When the speaker for the Third Estate, or common 
people, spoke of the nation as one family of which the 
lords were the elder brothers and the commons ths 
younger, he was sharply rebuked for his impertinence. 
" It is a great insolence," said the president of the 
nobles, " to try to establish any sort of equality be- 
tween us and them. They are to us as a valet to 
Ills master." One of the petitions presented by the 
nobility was, "that the common people should be for- 
bidden to carry pistols, wear velvet or satin, or own 
hunting-dogs." In this spirit the States-General separ- 
ated, not to meet again for one hundred and seventy 
four years. 

The young king, feeble and irresolute but disliking 
to submit, became daily more impatient of the control 
of his mother and her favorites. A young friend of 
his own, Albert De Luynes, persuaded him that Con- 
•cini and his wife were plotting against his life, and 
obtained permission to dispose of the Marshal by 



212 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

assassination. The programme was made between 
them and carried out by De Luynes, Louis appearing 
at a palace window as soon as the shot had been fired, 
and exclaiming joyfully, " Now I am King !" 

This cowardly act was quite in~keeping with his 
character. He was a mere puppet, worked by strings 
which other people pulled. Whoever was the strongest 
for the moment, pulled the hardest, and the King act- 
ed accordingly. When he had shaken off one tyrant 
it was only to fall into the hands of another. With 
all this he was obstinate and self-willed, so that his 
life was a series of struggles to get rid of some influence 
which irritated him, but which he had not streno;th to 
resist. The murder of Concini, instead of giving him 
the freedom he longed for,, only transferred the reins 
of power to De Luynes, and the king remained as 
much a cipher as ever until the death of the favorite a 
few years later gave him a short interval of indepen- 
dence. 

After the death of Concini, his wife still remained to 
be disposed of, and as there was no known crime of 
which she could be accused, her enemies had her tried 
for sorcery. When asked by what magical arts she 
had gained such power over the Queen, she answered 
proudly, " By the influence which a strong rnind exerts 
over a weak one." She was sentenced to be beheaded, 
and as she went to her death in the midst of a howling 
rabble, she said, " What a crowd of people to look at 
one poor creature !" Her firmness of mind and haught- 
iness sustained her to the last. 

Within ten years after King Henry's death, the great 
work he did for the peasants had all been undone by 



LOUIS XIII. 213 



the selfish tyranny of those who should have been their 
kindest friends. No more fowls in the pot for a Sun- 
day dinner ! If they were raised by the poor man, he 
must sell them to satisfy the demands of the great 
noble or the hard-hearted governor, who was again per- 
mitted to ride rough-shod over him. There was no more 
law and order. All had changed to a general scramble 
for money and offices, and the cleverest and most un- 
scrupulous were sure to come off the best. 

And now a name much o-reater than the kinsr's 
appears upon the page of history. It is that of 
Cardinal Richelieu, who for twenty years was the real 
king of France, governing Louis more absolutely 
than even his mother had ever done. For many years 
he had been on the side of the Queen-mother, patiently 
waitino; until the reio-n of the favorite should be over. 
Then, skillfully working his way into the king's 
privy council, he began the work of making over the 
country according to his own ideas. 

As a Roman Catholic, he wanted to get rid of the 
Huo'uenots. As a statesman, he desired to crush the 
power of the great nobles, and forever prevent them 
from setting themselves up against the king. As a 
patriot, he determined to humble the pride of Austria 
and Spain, and keep France up to the pitch of great- 
ness at which, she had stood in the time of Henry the 
Fourth. And with him to will was to do. 

In order to injure Spain and strengthen France, 
Richelieu hastened to arrano-e a marriao-e between 
Prince Charles of England, who had been betrothed 
to the Infanta of Spain, and Henrietta Maria, the king's 
sister. As Charles was a Protestant, this seems a strange 



214 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

action for a son of the Church ; but the Cardinal told 
the Pope when he protested against some injuries 
done to Catholics, that although he was a church- 
man, he was first a Frenchman. The Princess, who 
was then only fourteen years old, on being asked how 
she could make up her rniiLd to marry a Protestant, 
replied quickly, " Wliy not ? Was not my father one?' 

There had ah'eady been trouble among the French 
Huo'uenots. Treaties had been made and broken, 
towns taken and restored, as one party or the other 
triumphed for the moment, until at last the war came 
to a crisis in the siege of La Rochelle. This was a 
beautiful city on the western coast of France, which 
bad been strongly fortified by the Huguenots. The 
English were on their side in spite of the recent mar- 
riage, and sent them supplies by sea; and Cardinal 
Richelieu, who had the direction of the siege, saw that 
nothincv could be done unless he could fence them in 
on this side also. 

The navy of France was at that time very small, or 
perhaps he might have blockaded the harbor by plac- 
ing ships at the mouth of it. As that was out of the 
question, he decided to build a solid stone wall in the 
water far enough from the town to be out of reach of 
cannon. Before this stupendous work, which was 
called a mole, was finished, the English fleet, which 
might have broken through it, came and looked at it 
and then sailed away. After two or three similar dis- 
appointments the people of Rochelle made up their 
minds to stay there and starve, for they were deter- 
mined never to give up. 

With all the horrors of famine staring them in the 



LOUIS XIII. 215 



face, these heroic men and women kept firm in their 
purpose. The Mayor, at a town council, laid down his 
poniard on the table, and said it should str.b the first 
man who spoke of surrender. The poniard looked 
sharp and dangerous, and every body kept his mouth 
shut, on that subject at least. The Duchess of Rohan, 
daughter of the great Sully and wife of one of the 
j^roudest nobles in the land, lived, together with her 
daughter, for three months upon horseflesh. The poor 
died of hunger by thousands, but the stubborn Mayor 
still held out. -i* I am willing to draw lots," said he, 
" which of us shall be killed to feed the rest. As long- 
as there is one man left to keep the gates shut, it will 
be enouo'h." 

At last, however, the few people who were left re- 
fused to suffer any longer, and insisted on sending 
word that they were ready to surrender, provided that 
they could march out with drums beating and colors 
fljnng, and receive a free pardon for all offences and 
permission to worship as they chose. The Cardinal 
was amused at their impudence, but treated the de- 
mand rather as a good joke, and let them have their way. 

When the deputies came to settle the terms of 
peace with him they were obliged to ask that horses 
might be sent for them, as they were too weak to walk. 
It must have been a spectacle fit to move a heart 
of stone to see the poor living skeletons creeping 
along like shadows. The king gave them a dinner 
and sent provisions into the town; but it is said that 
many of those who still lived were choked by the 
first morsel of bread they ate, and died of plenty as 
those before them had died of huno-er. 



216 HISTORY OF FEANCE. 

When the garrison marched out, the conquerors 
were astonished to see only a hundred and fifty left 
out of many thousand; the rest had been killed in 
fio:htino; or had died of want. When the kino; rode into 
the city by the side of the Cardinal, a mournful sight 
met him everywhere. There were dead people in 
the streets, in the houses, in the churches. No one 
had strength to bury them, and the decaying corpses 
filled the air with a horrible odor. It was a curious 
circumstance that the next day after the king's visit 
to the city of Rochelle, the great mole which was the 
cause of its ruin was washed away into the sea by a 
violent storm. But though set free, as it were. La 
Rochelle never held up its head again. The fortifi- 
cations were torn down, the city was forbidden to have 
a mayor or any government of its own, and the Roman 
Catholics were restored to all their privileges. To 
this day Rochelle feels the effect of that fatal siege. 

When it was known that the Protestants were still 
to be allowed to worship in their own way, the Catholics 
were very indignant, calling Richelieu the " Hugue- 
not Cardinal," or " Protestant Pope," and trying to in- 
fluence the king against him. But they did not under- 
stand the great man who set the power and glory of 
France above every thing else in the world. He saw 
that it would be better for the country that the civil 
war should cease and that the Huguenots, who were still 
a great body of people, should lay down their arms; 
and he wanted to save all the strength there was in 
France for wars against her outside enemies. 

Richelieu was not permitted to carry out his plans 
without bitter opposition from the queen -mother and 



LOUIS XIII. 217 



her part^', and once Louis had actually been persuaded 
to dismiss him from office. He gave his promise, the 
disaffected party became wild with joy, and the good 
news was dispatched all over Europe. The Cardinal 
was just preparing to go into exile when a messenger 
came to call him to the king. He remained closeted 
with him for some time, and came out looking radiant; 
then unpacked his things and stayed where he was. 
Mary aiid her party, crestfallen, sank out of sight. The 
day on which this happened is called in French history 
the Day of the Dupes. 

After each discovery of a plot against him, and there 
were many, the Cardinal took a terrible vengeance on 
the guilty parties, and as these were mostly among 
the nobility, the headsman's axe was kept busy until 
scarcely a great lord remained who dared to raise his 
head above the level of the common people, lest it 
should be lopped off. The power of the crown, or, 
as we should say in this country, of the government, 
was to be all in all. As it was impossible for Richelieu 
to cut off the head of Mary de' Medici, he induced the 
cold-hearted king to send her away from court. In- 
stead of burying herself in the obscure country town 
to which she was ordered to retire, the queen-mother 
escaped to Brussels, where she could communicate 
with her friends in Spain. Louis could not forgive 
this; he never allowed her to return, and the widow 
of Henry the Fourth, the mother of Louis the Thirteenth, 
died in poverty in a foreign country. 

There was no one left to say No when the Cardinal 
said Yes. Instead of his being loyal to the king, the 
question was- always whether the king was loyal to 



218 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

him. He represented the rights, not of the People, 
but of the Crown. Nothing, not even the king him- 
self, was allowed to stand in the way of this right. 
It was said that Richelieu had made of Louis the first 
man in Europe, but the second man in France. We 
have no room to speak here of his foreign policy, 
which placed France at the head of all European 
nations. And for one good deed at least, the people of 
France had to thank the Cardinal; he put a stop to the 
barbarous practice of duelling. There was a law 
againt this crime to which nobody paid any attention, 
but when Richelieu had not only the survivor in a duel 
but also the seconds executed like common criminals, 
duelling fell into disuse. 

The Cardinal had always been noted for his magnif- 
icence, and as he drew near his end it seemed as if 
he meant to out-do himself in this respect. During 
his last illness, when it was necessary for him to make a 
journey to Lyons and back again, he had a good-sized 
room built and elegantly furnished, in which he might 
sit, walk about or lie down comfortably. This was 
carried on the shoulders of eighteen men, and such of 
his servants as he chose to have for companions rode 
inside with him. Where the city gates were not wide 
enough to admit this unusual vehicle, a great piece 
of wall was torn down, so that he might pass without 
being disturbed, and ditches were filled up or bridged 
over for the same purpose. 

Paris owes to Richelieu the beautiful " Jardin des 
Plantes," which still adorns it, and some of its great 
literary institutions. In speaking thus we do not 
imply any act of personal generosity on his part, for it 



LOUIS XIV. 219 



must always be remembered that public magnificence 
under a despotic government is only one among many 
modes of spending the hard-earned money of the 
people. 

Louis survived the Cardinal only five months. It 
seemed as if he could not, when alone, bear the bur- 
den which had been so lono; lifted from his shoulders. 
He died on the anniversary of his father's death, at 
forty-two years of age. He had no very noticeable 
faults, and very few virtues. He was brave in battle, 
but there is no great virtue in that; of moral courage, 
a much higher quality than physical, he had not a 
particle. He was cold-hearted and ungrateful, and 
saw his dearest friends sent to the block or driven into 
exile by Richelieu without an effort to save them. 
When the minister himself died, Louis only remarked, 
" There is a great politician gone," without remem- 
bering, apparently, that to this statesman his kingdom 
owedmuch of all that it possessed of glory andgreatness. 




CHAPTER XXIIL 

LOUIS XIV. — 1643-1715. 

[OUR days after the death of Louis the Thir- 
teenth, another Louis was brought before the 
Parliament to hold a "bed of justice." The 



little man of four years and a half old was seated in a 
great chair far too wide for him, and said in a sweet, 
childish voice, that he had come there to show his good- 



220 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

will to the Parliament, and that his chancellor would 
say the rest. It must have looked like a reception by 
Tom Thumb. 

But Master Louis had a pretty clear idea, even then, 
of the difference between him and other boys. A few 
days before his father's death, the king asked him if 
he knew what his name was. " I am Louis the Four- 
teenth," answered the boy, very innocently. "Not 
yet, my child, not yet," said his father, stroking his 
head softly, though we may imagine that he rather en- 
joyed seeing the spirit of his little son, so ready to 
take the new dignity upon him. Louis the Thirteenth 
had been a low-spirited, melancholy man, and this 
cheerful self-confidence must have been refreshing to 
him. 

He had appointed a council of Regency, not car- 
ing to trust his wife with the sole power of gov- 
ernment. But the first thing she did was to induce 
the Parliament to set aside his will and give her the 
entire control of affairs, taking for her chief adviser Car- 
dinal Mazarin, an adroit Italian priest, who always had 
a low bow and a submissive smile ready for every one. 

There could not have been a greater contrast than 
between him and the bold, haughty Richelieu; and at 
first it seemed as if all would go smoothly. Anne was 
so anxious to please everybody that she promised 
whatever was asked of her; and a witty courtier said 
that the whole French language at that time consisted 
of five words: " The queen is so good! " But as she 
could not possibly perform all her promises she soon 
made enemies, and disgraceful quarrels took the place 
of the general satisfaction. 



LOUIS XIV. 221 



We shall find it convenient to divide Louis the Four- 
teenth's loiig reign of seventy-two years into three 
periods. The first is that of youth, from his accession 
to the death of Cardinal Mazarin; the second, when he 
governed for himself, includes the most glorious part 
of his reign, during which he profited by the services 
of the great Colbert, his able and upright prime-min- 
ister; the last is a time of misfortune, when he began 
to persecute Protestants and to lose that splendid place 
among the kings of Europe which he had held so long. 

Five days after the death of Louis the Thirteenth, a 
great victory was won over the Spaniards at Rocroi in 
the Netherlands by the Duke of Enghien, afterwards 
known as the Great Conde. This was the first of a 
series of battles gained against the House of Austria 
by this celebrated general, who was helped by another 
almost as great, named Turenne. In 1648 the peace 
of Wesphalia put an end to the Thirty Years' War in. 
Germany, and gave the French what they had long 
been looking at with coveto.us eyes — the river Rhine for 
their eastern boundary. The provinces of Alsace and 
Lorraine, which were annexed to France during the 
reign of Louis the Fourteenth and Louis the Fifteenth, 
remained in its possession down to our own times, 
when they again became a part of Germany. 

The war with Spain dragged on for some j'-ears 
longer, but a struggle of so much greater importance 
was jroino- on within France itself that other countries 
were almost forgotten. This is called the war of the 
Fronde, and originated in a question of taxes. 
Richelieu had left the treasury well filled, but Mazarin 
soon eniptied it by his bad management. The expenses 



222 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

of the Spanish war were enormous, and fresh demands 
were made on the people. A new tax called the 
octroi was levied upon every article of food or other 
merchandise brought into Paris from the country, and 
was so intolerable to the trading community that the 
Parliament refused to res-ister it. This enra2:ed Anne 
of Austria, who had been brought up in the despotic 
court of Spain and did not know what resistance by 
the people meant. Finding that she could not control 
public feeling and that the people were everywhere 
rising in rebellion, she took her two sons, Louis and 
the Duke of Orleans, and went to St. Germain, where 
she and her friends lived a forlorn sort of life for some 
time, while the excitement in Paris continued to 
increase. The palace was unfurnished, and the cour- 
tiers could scarcely find a bundle of straw to lie upon. 
Queen Henrietta Maria of England and her daughter, 
(who afterward married the Duke of Orleans), were 
guests at the palace, and the princess sometimes had 
to lie in bed during whole days for lack of fire. 

Meantime, the civil war changed its character and 
became a mere party-contest, where both sides forgot 
the original cause of quarrel, and joined one side or 
the other from personal reasons. The word Fronde 
means a sling, and the combatants were called Fron- 
deurs in derision, because they behaved like boys 
slinging stones in the streets. 

The Prince of Conde, having finished beating the 
Spaniards, came with his army to Paris to attack the 
Parliament. The latter, hastily gathering some troops 
to2:ether, were defeated at Charenton bv Conde; but 
after that, most of the fighting was done with very 



LOUIS XIV. 223 



harmless weapons. The two parties said all the witty- 
things about each other that they could think of, made 
ridiculous pictures and published a great deal of bad 
poetry and some abusive pamphlets. If hard names 
had been bullets, there would scarcely have been a 
man left alive. A great deal was done, too, with 
ribbons. The army of Paris looked like a milliner's 
shop as it marched out in the morning decked in feath- 
ers and gay streamers of silk. In the evening it 
would come back defeated and draggled, to be received 
by the frivolous crowd with hootings and roars of 
lauofhter. The whole thino; was turned into a farce. 

After a while there was some real bloodshed, and 
the great generals Conde and Turenne taking oppo- 
site sides, there was some rather warm work for a 
while. An active and somewhat restless young lady 
called Mademoiselle de Montpensier, a cousin of the 
king, actually got possession of the great fortress 
called the Bastille, and turned its guns on Louis when 
he wanted to enter his capital. At last Cond6, in a 
fit of disgust at the conduct of the queen, left his 
country and passed into the service of Spain; Anne 
and her son returned to Paris, the questions in dispute 
were allowed quietly to drop, and the War of the 
Fronde came to an end, after an inglorious struggle of 
five years. 

As usual, the poor were the greatest sufferers. The 
young noble who put himself at the head of a troop 
of horse and dashed over the country after the enem}^, 
did not care whose cornfields and gardens he trampled 
down, nor how many families were ruined by the 
pillage of his soldiers. If he saw a whole village on 



224 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

fire at once, it was a pleasant sight to him, provided 
the village belonged to the opposite party; and if it 
did not, his regret was not that the poor wretches had 
been driven starving from their homes, but that the 
enemy had gained an advantage over himself. 

Not far from Paris there was a convent for nuns 
called Port Royal, and the good abbess wrote to a 
friend: " We are all busy making soups for the poor. 
Everything is pillaged. Cornfields are trampled down 
by the cavalry before the owners' eyes. Nobody will 
plough or dig, for he is not certain of reaping what 
he sows; all is stolen. We have concealed as many 
peasants and cattle as we can in our own house. The 
dormitory and chapter-house are full of horses. We 
are almost stifled by being shut up w^ith these beasts, 
but we could not resist the cries of the poor. Forty 
cows are hidden in the cellar. We have torn up our 
linen clothes to make bandao'es for the wounded. Our 
firewood is used up, and we dare not send into the 
woods for more, for they are full of marauding soldiers." 

And this was only in one little district. If we 
multiply it by thousands, we shall then have only a 
faint idea of the miseries of industrious France. But 
it did not long disturb the enjoyments of idle France, 
and the court was soon as gay as ever. 

At thirteen the young king had been declared able 
to govern for himself; at twenty-one, it was high time 
for him to take a wife. Philip the Fourth of Spain 
had a daughter who would suit him admirably, and 
both countries were tired of the war, which had been 
going on all this time. With Conde on one side and 
Turenne on the other, the victories and defeats were 



LOUIS XIV. 225 



about equal, and it seemed as if there would be no 
end to it. But just here a difficulty arose. The king 
of Spain would make no peace unless Conde could be 
restored to all his honors and dignities. Mazarin 
naturally refused to reward in that way a traitor to 
his country; and it was not until Philip threatened 
that he would 2:ive Flanders to the Prince as an inde- 
pendent possession that the Cardinal gave up the 
point. The Prince was pardoned, and made governor 
of Burgundy. 

Some time before this, Conde had captured a town 
from the French, and, as an act of courtesy, had sent 
back to Louis some standards taken from his troops. 
''The Spaniards are so little used to taking French col- 
ors that I will not deprive them of these," answered 
the king, disdainfully, and sent the flags back again 
After the peace, Conde knelt at the feet of Louis to 
ask his pardon, to which the monarch answered, 
" Cousin, after the great services you have rendered 
to the Crown, I do not wish to remember any action 
that has done harm only to yourself." I think we may 
say that Louis, at this time, at least, was " every inch 
a king." 

All things being settled, the little Isle of Pheasants 
in the river Bidassoa again saw a splendid company 
assembled on its shores. A grand pavilion was built 
in the middle of the island, and a chalk-mark was run 
through the center of the floor, to show the exact place 
where Spain ended and France began. Across this 
mark the two kings exchanged a solemn embrace, and 
Anne of Austria met her brother, Philip the. Fourth, 
after a forty-five years' separation. 
15 



226 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Louis was very much pleased with his bride, whose 
name was Maria Theresa. He treated her far from 
well, and yet, after twenty-three years of married life, 
he declared that her death was the first regrret she had 
ever caused him. In the marriage-contract it was pro- 
vided that the bride should give up all right to the 
throne of Spain, for herself and her descendants. 
This agreement should be remembered, as events of 
great importance turned upon it afterwards. 

It was Cardinal Mazarin who had brought about this 
delicate and difficult Peace of the Pyrenees, and whose 
name was in every mouth. But the Cardinal was soon 
to be beyond the reach of earthly praise or glory. 
Very slowly and regretfully he gave up his hold on 
life. One of his attendants heard him, while walking 
about among his vast treasures of art and wealth, say: 
" And must I leave all this behind? What trouble I 
have taken to collect these things, and now I shall 
never see them again." He had been a bad home- 
ruler for France, — wasteful, grasping and indolent, but 
lie probably did not suspect the harm he had done. 
His greatest failing was an inordinate love of money. 
He made use of his position to enrich himself to such 
an extent that at his death he left property, gained by 
very discreditable means, which would equal forty mil- 
lions of our dollars. On the other hand, he established 
(probably with the people's money), the French Acad- 
emy of Painting and Sculpture, the magnificent 
Mazarine library, and the College of Four Nations, an 
institution for the education of children from four 
countries which had been added to France by the 
treaty of Westphalia. 



LOUIS XIV, 227 



When the Cardinal was dead, the first person who 
came to Louis on business asked to whom he should 
address himself. " To me," replied the king. 

A capacity for hard work was what distinguished 
Louis the Fourteenth from most other king's. He 
began with the determination to understand his own 
business thoroughly, and to be certain, from his own 
knowledge, that it was done properly. He spent 
regularly eight hours a day in his cabinet at the public 
business. Ministers, chancellors, and all officers of 
the State were charged to get their instructions directly 
from himself, and to do nothing without his orders. 
All this was part of a system of despotism which was 
very much' against the true interests of the nation; 
but this must not blind our eyes to the example he 
set of industry and regularity. 

Mazarin said of Louis, "There is enough in him to 
make four kino-s and one honest man." This shows 
that the Cardinal had not a very high opinion of kings, 
and thought an honest man rather a rare product of 
nature; perhaps it was so in his time. Certainly his 
own hoarded millions made a shameful contrast to the 
emptiness of the royal treasury. It was time that 
someone should take hold, and Louis soon found out 
both the right man to dismiss and the right man to 
put in his place. 

Mazarin, when on his death-bed, had said to the king, 
" Manage your affairs yourself. Sire, and raise no more 
ministers to the height at which your goodness has 
placed me. I see by what I might have done how 
dangerous it is for a king to give his servants such 
power." He himself had employed Nicholas Fouquet 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



as Superintendent of Finance, an office corresponding 
to our Secretary of the Treasury. This man, a person 
of brilliant talents and great taste for literature and 
art, was shamefully dishonest. Mazarin knew it, 
everybody knew it; and yet Fouquet went on stealing 
the public money, falsifying the accounts, and spend- 
ing most wastefuUy what he did not take for himself, 
and still he kept his office. 

He was so used to offering bribes to everybody that 
he even tried to bribe the king. He sold the rich 
office of Attorney-General, which he held in addition 
to the other, for fourteen hundred thousand livres, and 
gave a million of them to Louis, who was in pressing 
need of money, no doubt thinking that he had bound 
His Majesty to him for ever. 

There was a proverb among the old heathen, "Whom 
the gods would destroy, they first make mad," and it 
seemed to be true in this case. Fouquet had built him- 
self a magnificent palace which was filled with costly 
works of art and surrounded by the most exquisite 
gardens; and he had the imprudence to invite the King 
here to an entertainment more splendid than any 
which that monarch had ever offered to his own guests. 
As Louis saw the tables loaded with silver and gold 
dishes, and the noble company pouring their com- 
pliments into the ear of the smiling and self-satisfied 
host, he could scarcely refrain from having him given 
up to justice on the spot. 

Anne of x\ustria advised him against this, saying, 
" Such an action would not be honorable to you, my 
son, when the poor man is ruining himself, to give you 
an entertainment." He was ruining himself, indeed, 



LOUIS XIV. 229 



but not in the way the queen-mother meant. He was 
arrested soon afterward and kept in prison for three 
years while his trial went on. Then he was senten- 
ced to banishment and confiscation of all his property; 
but the King, thinking this too mild a punishment, had 
him imprisoned for life in the gloomy fortress of 
Pignerol. 

This unnecessary harshness gives the key-note to 
Louis's whole life. No punishment could be too severe 
for any one who had offended him. No sense of jus- 
tice whispered to him that since he had deliberately 
neglected for years to look into a matter which he 
knew must be wrong, it woald be enough to take 
away the offender's property and send him aAvay for- 
ever from his country as the regular court of justice 
had decided should be done. The king meant to 
show that he was master. 

His .favorite saying was, "I'Etat, c'est moi;" "I 
am the State." With this idea he began his life, and 
in this spirit he carried it out to the end. At seven- 
teen years of age he went, booted and spurred and 
with a riding- whip in his hand, into the room where his 
Parliament was en2:ao:cd in debatino- on certain taxes ' 
and ordered them to mind their own business, which 
was to register his edicts, not to discuss them. His 
imperious will gained the victory, then and always, 
where his own people were concerned, and no king 
was ever more slavishly obeyed. 



230 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

GILAPTER XXIY, 

TO THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN — 1G78. 




OUQUET'S place was filled by a very dif- 
ferent person, whom historians have agreed 
to call the great Colbert. lie Tound the 
public money in the same condition it had been in 
before Sully's time. Only about one-third of the taxes 
paid ever reached the royal treasury, while the 
expenses of collection amounted to two-thiriis of what 
was assessed. Tiie result was an enormous debt and 
dreadful sulfei-ing among the poor, who were almost 
the only ones to be taxed. 

It is hard for us to believe in this day that the 
nobility and clergy, with their immense incomes, paid 
scarcely any taxes at all. We do not wonder that the 
woi-king classes at last arose against such a state of 
things as this, but rather that they ever bore it at all. 
One letter written to Colbert at this time says, "the 
poor are eating grass and i-(-)ots in our meadows like 
cattle. Those who can find dead carcases devour them, 
and unless God takes pity upon them they will soon 
be eating one another." Another says; " We have 
had to throw open the doors of our great hospital, 
having no longer any food to give to those wlio are in 
it. I can assure you, there are j)ersons in this town 
who have gone for whole days without anything to eat." 

These people were so wasted with hunger that they 
had no strength to cultivate the ground, and their 
cattle had already been seized by the government lor 



TO THE FEACE OF NIMEGUEN. 231 

taxes. The liirirc mind of Colbert saw at once what a 
false principle regulated these thino-s, and, while 
advising the king to excuse the people from paying 
their arrears, he labored to introduce a system which 
in later times has become universal; that of taxing- 
houses and lands, incomes and luxuries, instead of the 
blood and bones of the laborer. He did not entirely 
succeed, but he did much to relieve the burdens which 
tlie people were groaning luider, and by his nuinage- 
ment nine-tenths of what was collected went directly 
into the government chest, leaving a large sum there 
for (»xtra expenses. 

Those expenses began oidy too soon. Though 
Louis allowed some years to go by without attacking 
Ids neiglibors, he had none the less a passion for war 
whenever it could be made the means of increasing 
his own glory. It is impossible to give the details of 
his many wars. The slightest possible mention of 
them will suffice. 

f At the d(\ath of his father-in-law, Philip the Fourth, 
No claimed Flanders and the Franche Comt(j, which had 
once been part of Burgundy, as belonging to his wife, 
who was an older sister of the new king of Spain, 
Charles the Second. When reminded that he had 
given up all claim to any such inheritance when he 
married, ho replied that the contract was good for 
nothing because the queen's dowry had never been 
paid. 

CondeandTurenne soon conquered these provinces, 
assisted l)y the great military engineer, Vauban, and 
accompanied by Louis and many of the young nobility. 
Peace was made with Spain, but it would not naturally 



232 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

be ao'reeable to other nations to see the kins; of one 
gradually swallowing up the countries in his neigh- 
borhood, for no one could tell whose turn would come 
next. So England, Holland and Sweden made what 
was called the Triple Alliance, by which they bound 
themselves to stand by one another against Louis, and 
protect the weaker nations who were in danger from 
his ambition. 

It happened that just at that time Charles the 
Second, a very mean and greedy king, was on the 
throne of England. He hated liberty in his secret 
heart quite as much as Louis did, and had only joined 
the Dutch Republic, Holland, by the persuasion of his 
ministers, who cared much more for. the interest of 
England than he did. Louis took advantage of his 
necessities to send the Duchess of Orleans (Charles's 
sister and his own sister-in-law), on a secret mission to 
him to persuade him to break off from the Triple 
Alliance. The pretty Henrietta accomplished this 
without difficulty, and Charles accepted a yearly pen- 
sion from Louis, which was paid to him secretly as 
long; as he lived. 

Louis had from the besfinnino' meant to make war 
on Holland as soon as he could get England to break 
off her friendship with the Dutch. He could not 
forgive this humble republic, which less than sixty 
years before had freed itself from Spain, for presum- 
ing to join an alliance against him, and he longed to 
punish it. He invaded the country with a splendid 
army, nominally commanded by himself, but really 
under the direction of Conde and Turenne, with all 
the most skillful captains in France in their train. 



TO THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN. 233 

Everything they did was reported to Paris with the 
wildest enthusiasm, as if Alexander the Great and 
Julius Cassar had been rolled into one to make the 
still greater Louis. The army took many towns and 
seemed likely to conquer all Holland, when, by a 
change in the government, William, Prince of Orange, 
the nephew of Charles the Second of England, was 
placed in command of the defence. Holland was 
poor enough in men and money, but she had one ally 
that Louis had not counted on — the ocean ; and when 
her fortunes seemed nearly desperate, William of 
Orange ordered the dykes which kept out the sea to 
be cut through; the country was flooded, the French 
were forced to retire, and Holland was saved. We 
are tempted to wish that every invasion might end in 
defeat. 

" A war with Germany came next after this, during 
which Tarenne committed the most cruel deeds in the 
Palatinate. The horrible ravages made by his troops 
— the burnino* of towns, the murder of unarmed 
citizens, men, women and children, the destruction of 
the entire harvest — all these make a picture of blood 
and desolation which must darken his name forever. 
Ho was not opposhig an army; no resistance was made; 
it was the wantonness of revenge. 

The war continued with great fury until the death 
of Turenne, who was replaced by the great Conde. 
This general was then very old, and had retired from 
military life; he served during only one campaign, and 
his eventful life came to a close in peace. A great 
deal more fighting was done, which it would be unprofit- 
able to relate in detail, so I shall pass on to the Peace 



234 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

of NimeguGD, in 1678, which put an end to the war 
for a short time. By this treaty Spain gave up the 
whole of the Franche-Oomte and many strong towns 
on the border of Flanders. The Empire of Germany 
and Holland got off more easily, but France remained 
without a question the first state in Europe in power 
and importance. The delighted magistrates of Paris 
solemnly voted to Louis the Fourteenth the title of 
"The Great," and built the two grand triumphal 
arches of St. Denis and St. Martin in honor of his 
victories. 

The change that had come over the fortunes of the 
country since the death of Mazarin must have seemed 
at first almost like magic. Not only was the revenue 
increased without unbearable taxes, but new enter- 
prises sprang up in every quarter. The great canal 
of Languedoc was made, uniting the waters of the 
Bay of Biscay with those of the Mediterranean; trad- 
ing companies were established with the East Indies 
and other countries, which poured money into the 
pockets of French^ merchants, and workmen were 
brouo-ht from all over the world to teach the French 
how to manufacture many articles for which they had 
previously sent elsewhere. 

Gobelin tapestry, the finest plate glass, the richest 
dress-materials, the most superb carpets, were made in 
such quantitie:s that the French began to export them. 
It was forbidden to bring lace into France from for- 
eign lands, and as enormous quantities of this expensive 
fabric were worn by the courtiers, thousands of French 
women and children were soon busily employed in its 
manufacture. Admirable roads were made from one 



TO THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN. 235 

end of the kingdom to the other; a great navy filled 
the ports and drove away the pirates from the Medi- 
terranean; several palaces already begun were finished 
under Colbert's administration. The Louvre, St. Ger- 
main, and other splendid buildings still bear witness 
to his energy and good taste. 

But there came a time when even Colbert's wise econ- 
omy failed to provide for the king's willful extravagance 
or for the money he squandered in useless wars. Having 
at all times a oTeat dread of death, Louis took a dis- 
like to his palace of St. Germain, because from it he 
could see the towers of St. Denis, the cathedral where 
he must one day sleep with his fathers; and he chose 
to build another at Versailles, where he could be shut 
in from all annoying sights. 

On this vast and totally unnecessary pile of build- 
ings he expended a sum which would be equal in our 
time to nearly two hundred millions of dollars. The 
pleasure-grounds which surrounded it were sixty miles 
in circumference, and whole groves were transplanted 
to fill this vast space. Water was brought at first 
from the distant Seine, and afterwards a river ninety 
miles away was turned from its bed and made to min- 
ister to the caprice of the " Grand Monarque." The 
painting and sculpture lavished on this place would 
have filled twenty palaces. But the taxation for this 
and similar purposes became enormous, and Colbert 
dared to remonstrate, not only against this extrava- 
gance, but against the morxstrous expenditures of the 
court. 

" A us'^less banquet at a cost of a thousand crowns 
causes me incredible pain," he wrote to the king. 



236 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

''Your majesty must pardou me, but it seems to me as 
if you were beginning" to prefer your pleasures to 
every thing else. At the very time when your majesty 
told me that the morsel of bread must be taken from 
the people's mouth to provide for the navy, you spent 
two hundred thousand livres for a trip to Versailles." 
Plain speaking, this, and such as few men dared to 
address to the great monarch. It was not at all to 
Louis's taste, and although he did not openly quarrel 
with Colbert, whose services were important to him, 
he treated him with harshness and neglect, and constant- 
ly blamed him for spending too much money. 

When the great minister lay on his death-bed, Louis 
wrote him a kind letter, an honor which many of his 
subjects would have been, almost willing to die in 
order to receive; but Colbert would not open it, sup- 
posing it to be only the usual sneering fault-finding. 
" I dont want to hear anything more about him," he 
said. " Now at any rate he might leave me alone." 
Colbert left a large fortune, honestly gained, but the 
ignorant and brutal populace, remembering Mazarin 
and Fouquet, cursed his memory, and it was necessary 
to bury his remains secretly by night, to save them 
from the fury of the mob. 

It must have been a curious spectacle to see the 
fawnino* "courtiers hoverino; about Louis the Great, 
all anxious for a smile or even a look from his aw^ful 
face, each one trembling at the thought of his frown. 
They had but one thought among them: " The King ! 
the King ! " They seem to have had nothing 
better to do from morninp; to nio-ht than to watch 
his looks and motions, and listen for the words 



TO THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN. 237 

that he deigned to let fall from his august 
lips. Every peculiarity in his walk or manner 
was instantly mimicked by the noble crowd. 
Being short of stature, he wore shoes with heels 
four inches high, so as to look more imposing, and 
added a top-story to his head in the shape of an enor- 
mous wig, covered with stiff curls. Of course eveiy 
man about the court also wore high heels and a curly 
wig, and the consequence is that all their portraits 
look alike. 

Louis had extremely gracious manners when he 
chose to be agreeable, therefore gracious manners 
became the fashion, and vast importance was attached 
to them; but they covered a great deal of wickedness. 
It was generally understood that it was of no impor- 
tance what kind of life a man led, provided he was 
in favor with the king. Louis himself set an example 
of unblushing vice in his private life, neglecting his 
queen and putting in her place other women who 
were received at court as if they had been the best- 
behaved ladies in the land, while the excellent Maria 
Theresa was scarcely heard of. 

He loved to gather men of literary talent about him, 
not because he loved books himself, for he was so 
ignorant he could scarcely read or write, but because 
he had sense enough to know that their presence gave 
additional dignity to his court. He knew notliing 
of the history either of his own or of any other nation, 
and therefore lacked entirely the knowledge of life 
and the power of comparing himself with others which 
even a limited course of study would have given him. 
He honestly thought himself the greatest man in the 



238 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

world, and this conceit often made him ridiculous in 
the eyes of foreigners, though to his own countrymen 
he appeared little less than godlike. 

He got what he wanted, and that was incessant 
flattery and servility. His active mind showed itself 
in regulating every thing that was done at the court 
down to the most trifling particulars. The person 
who was allowed to hold a candle while he undressed 
himself was made proud for the rest of his life. The 
happy man whose duty it was to pass in his wig 
behind the bed-curtains at the end of a long cane, so 
that he might put it on before any human eye looked 
at him in the morning, was the envy of the less 
favored courtiers. The permission to wear a certain 
kind of short jacket like one worn by the king, was a 
grace to go down on one's knees for. 

Louis also made a complete list of those who might 
sit in his presence, who might stand and who might 
kneel. It was the greatest of all privileges to be ad- 
mitted to his dressino:-room and have the honor of see- 
ing his clothes put on or taken ofi". And the strange 
thing about it all is that this admiration was real and 
not pretended. The king might be acting a part, but 
the courtiers were not. Even the preachers fell into 
the same poor way, and instead of hearing reproofs for 
his vices when he condescended to listen to their ser- 
mons, he heard nothing but smooth sentences about 
religion in general, mixed with a good many references 
to the earthly monarch who favored the house of 
God with his presence. A funeral oration on some 
distinguished man or woman could scarcely be con- 
cluded without some compliment to the living king. 



TO THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN. 239 

Louis has been much praised for his liberality. 
Here is a specimen of it. When he built the 
chateau of Marly, (which cost some eight or 
ten millions of dollars,) he gave a grand entertain- 
ment at its opening. Each lady found in her 
dressing-room a complete set of clothing of the most 
magnificent description, including jewels; each guest 
was at liberty to give entertainments in his " apart- 
ment," — (which does not mean in French a single 
room, but an entire suite), — where repasts Avere served 
with the same eleo-ance as at the kino;'s own table; 
servants, horses and carriages waited the bidding of 
the guests, and every thing was done to make an 
earthly Paradise. Very liberal, indeed : and who 
paid for all this? The king, of course. But where 
did the king get the money for the splendid enter- 
tainments of which this is only one of many — for the 
vast chateaux, the exquisite works of art, the costly 
service? It was ground out of the bodies of the poor. 
The palmy days of Colbert's early ministry were over. 
The prosperous merchant could still count his gains 
with pleasure, for it was not upon the rich that the 
burden fell; but the hard-working artisan and the 
toiling peasant groaned under taxes which, as Colbert 
said, took the very bread out of their mouths. Remem- 
ber, when you read of such " liberality," who it is 
that pays for it. 

Another instance given of the king's generosity is 
that when the daughters of his ministers were married, 
he gave to each one a portion of two hundred thousand 
crowns. And all the court said, " Oh, what a generous 
king! " And the poor man said, " I can not plough 



240 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

my land tins year; I must dig it up as well as I can 
with my hands. My cattle were all taken for taxes." 
In our own republican country we complain some- 
times of heavy taxes, but this is because we forget the 
sufferings of the generations that are past. There are 
two reasons why our taxes are easily borne — the first 
is that they are as thistle-down to hailstones compared 
with those we have been describing; the second is 
that we impose them on ourselves by our own votes, 
and expend them by our own officers, an idea which 
had not dawned in France in the seventeenth century. 




CHAPTER XXV. 

TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV 1715. 

jHE first thing Louis did after the peace of 
Nimeixuen was to seize various fortified towns 
belono-ino- to his nei2:hbors, sometimes under 
the pretence that they had once belonged to France, 
sometimes without any pretence at all. One town ho 
took because he said it had been forgotten when the 
treaty was made. His habit of keeping up warlike 
operations in a time of perfect peace grew to be so 
much a matter of course that nobody was surprised at 
it, though all resented it. Various nations in Europe, 
were planning to attack him by joining their forces in 
a grand coalition, but before this could be completed 
an event took place in France itself which fell upon 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV. 241 

the continent like a thunder-clap. This was the Revo- 
cation of the Edict of Nantes, a decree that had been 
issued by Henry the Fouith to give Protestants the 
right of worshiping God in their own way, which in 
those days was considered a great privilege. Through 
the long reign of his son it had never been disturbed, 
even hv the Roman Catholic Richelieu, except where 
it had led to rebellion; and when that was over it 
remained in force as before. But for several 
3'ears in France it had been infringed upon little 
by little, until at last Louis was induced by his 
friend Madame de Maintenon to take it away alto- 
gether. 

This lady was in many respects an admirable woman, 
very dilFerent from the court-favorites who came before 
her. She had a fine intellect, charming manners, and 
no doubt sincerely desired to use her influence over 
the king only for his good; but in matters of religion 
she was bigoted and narrow-minded, and had no 
trouble in persuading Louis that the best atonement 
he could make for his many sins would be to persecute 
those who did not believe in what she called the true 
faith. Another person who had great power over the 
king's mind at this time was his minister of war, 
Louvois, who had succeeded Colbert in his confidence. 
Louvois was constantly urging him to undertake new 
enterprises, and had a savage, impatient disposition, to 
which the rooting out of heretics was a positive 
pleasure. It was not that he cared for religion, but 
he loved fighting for its own sake, and was never con- 
tented unless he could keep Louis occupied with some 
kind of warfare. 
16 



242 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

The king began his operations by what were con- 
sidered mild measures. The Huguenots were preached 
at and talked to, and when this failed, bribes were 
offered to them. Those who were willing to chansre 

O CD 

their religion were excused from having soldiers 
billeted upon them, while those who continued firm 
had an extra number. Children were allowed at 
seven years old to say which form of worship they 
chose, and if they said "The Mass," they could be 
taken away from their parents and brought up by the 
priest. ' 

All this, however, made but little impression on the 
great mass of the Protestants, who were quite as much 
attached to their faith as Madame de Maintenon was 
to hers. Some of them escaped from France into 
Protestant countries, which brought an order from the 
king that all who were detected in trying to quit the 
country should be sent to the galleys. If they offered 
to sell their property before going away, it was to be 
confiscated. They were forbidden to hold meetings 
for religious worship. One order of the King runs 
thus: "All women not noble found at such assemblies 
shall be whipped, and branded with the fleur-de-lis." 
Oh, chivalrous king, who was so polite to women that 
he never received a curtsey from even a chambermaid 
without takino- off his hat to her! 

After this came the dragonnades. It was an idea of 
Louvois's, Squadrons of dragoons were sent into the 
heretical districts and there quartered on the inhabi- 
tants, with orders to torment them in every possible 
manner short of injury to life or limb. Within this 
limit they had full power. Every brutal outrage that 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV, 243 

could be devised was perpetrated on the wretched in- 
habitants by these irresponsible ruffians. 

All this at length produced its effect. The spirit 
of the people was broken, and many thousands of 
them became Roman Catholics, or at least professed 
themselves so. " Not a post arrives," wrote Madame 
de Maintenon, " without brincrino- the king; tidino;s 
which fill him with joy; the conversions take place by 
thousands." In the midst of all this the formal decree 
of revocation of the Edict of Nantes was signed in the 
year 1685, eighty-seven years after Henry the Fourth 
had granted it. 

Not content with this, Louis added other articles. 
All Huguenot places of worship were to be leveled 
with the ground; the pastors were to quit the kingdom 
within a fortnight; their cona;re2:ations were not al- 
lowed to follow them, and the children must be bap- 
tized by Roman Catholic priests and brought up in " the 
Church." 

Notwithstanding the severity of this decree, many 
of the Huo-uenots refused to obey it, and unspeakable 
cruelties were practised upon them. The pastors, 
such as chose to stay with their people, were hanged, 
burned, or broken alive upon the wheel — a horrible 
punishment, until then reserved for the basest of crimi- 
nals. The king probably knew very few of these 
particulars; he was fully occupied in hearing his 
praises sung by preachers and poets who were com- 
paring him to the Emperor Constantine and to Char- 
lemagne, both upholders of Christianity. 

In spite of the decree forbidding it, the Huguenots 
contrived to get away by thousands. Through Holland 



244 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

in the north and Switzerland in the south, such as 
could not gain the sea emigrated and joined their 
friends in England and Germany. It is estimated 
that between two and three hundred thousand of the 
most industrious class in France left their country in 
the fifteen years that remained before the close of the 
century. But they carried their arts and their skill 
with them, and the loss of France was her neighbors' 
gain. 

In the meantime the countries which Louis had so 
wantonly injured after the peace of Nimeguen had 
been gathering up their strength, and formed what 
they called the " Grand Alliance " against him. He 
did not wait for the attack, but sent his armies into 
German}^ and conquered the district called the Palati- 
nate. Being obliged afterward to abandon this, he 
ordered it, by the advice of Louvois, to be laid waste, 
to prevent its being occupied by the enemy. The un- 
happy inhabitants found the horrors which had befallen 
them under Turenne far exceeded. Vineyards were 
destroyed, orchards cut down, houses burned; 
even the graveyards were invaded and the bones of 
the dead scattered over the plain. The magnificent 
palace of the Elector at Heidelberg was blown up. 
One hundred thousand people^ driven from their 
homes, wandered over the country calling down the 
vengeance of Heaven on the cruelty of their oppress- 
ors. 

At about the same time James the Second was 
driven from the throne of England by an outraged 
people who could endure his tyranny no longer, and 
Louis sent him men and money, and fought two battles 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV. 245 

in his behalf — one by land in Ireland called the Battle 
of the Boyne, and one at sea off Cape La Hogue, in Nor- 
mandy. Both were unsuccessful; William of Orange 
was raised to the vacant throne, and James, hospitably 
received by Louis, spent the rest of his life at St. 
Germain, discontented and ungrateful. 

The war against the Grand Alliance was closed in 
1697 by the Peace of Ryswick, at which Louis was 
forced to give back many of his conquests, to acknowl- 
edge William of Orange as king of England, and even 
to destroy the fortifications of Strasburg and other 
places on which he had spent enormous sums of money. 
So the closing years of the seventeenth century found 
France once more at peace. 

But what a peace ! It was the quiet of utter exhaus- 
tion. It is said " the people were perishing to the 
sound of Te Deunis. " Their usual food was rye por- 
ridge, though the best paid laborers, Avho earned 
about eight cents a day, could sometimes buy a little 
refuse meat from the butchers' shops. But, rich or 
poor, they must furnish three meals of meat a day to 
the soldiers billeted upon them. The monstrous 
extravaoance of the kino; and the court had somewhat 
abated, however, and life at the palace was pronounced 
very dull by those who remembered the splendors of 
Marly and the entertainments at Yersailles. At the 
time of the Peace of Ryswick, Louis was already mak- 
ing plans which led to anew war more destructive than 
the last. 

This was called the war of the Spanish succession. 
Charles the Second of Spain having died without 
children, the throne was claimed by those of his two 



246 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

sisters, one of whom had married Louis the Fourteenth 
and the other one the Emperor of Germany. 

Maria Theresa had solemnly renounced at her mar- 
riage with Louis all right to the crown of Spain for 
herself and her descendants, but the old question of the 
unpaid dowry came up, and Louis determined to claim 
the country for his grandson, the second son of the 
Dauphin. The young prince was duly equipped and 
sent off to Spain to reign there as Philip the Fifth, 
Louis saying as he embraced him at parting, " Go, 
my child ! there are no longer any Pyrenees !" 

He meant that France and Spain would from that 
time be like only one kingdom, but he ought to have 
remembered that though he willed that there should 
be no Pyrenees, there was still an England, a Holland 
and a Germany, that might object to the breaking 
down of the partition- wall between the two countries. 

The Emperor of Germany of course resisted this 
claim, thinking that his own son had the best right to 
it, and while he was preparing to go to war with Louis, 
the latter very foolishly united all Protestant Europe 
against him by acknowledging the right of James 
Stuart, (the son of James the Second of England, who 
had just died), to the throne of England. This brought 
England into the quarrel, and though Louis might 
have coped with Germany alone, the two together 
were irresistible. 

The two greatest generals of the age commanded 
the armies of the enemies of France; the Duke of 
Marlborough that of England, Prince Eugene of Savoy 
that of Germany. In the course of five years they 
routed the French at Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV. 247 

and Malplaquet, besides gaining lesser victories. Tiie 
French soldiers fought with the utmost bravery; but 
ill spite of this, the Emperor's son was proclaimed in 
Spain under the title of Charles the Third, and Philip 
was obliged to fly from his capital. 

Well might the old king write to him: "If you 
thought it was going to be an easy or pleasant thing to 
be a king, you were very much mistaken! " 

Nature seemed to be against Louis as well as man. 
The winter of 1708-9 was so frightfully cold that even 
the rushino; waters of the Rhone were frozen over, and 
the olive-trees perished in the ground. The peasantry 
died by thousands of cold and hunger. The whole year 
was one of fearful famine. The s-rain sown did not 
germinate, but withered in the ground, and the fruit- 
trees remained leafl.ess. The king sent his silver 
and gold table-dishes to be coined into money to buy 
food for the poor, and many of the nobles followed his 
example, but what was gained did not go far. Madame 
de Maintenon set the example to the court of eating- 
bread made of oatmeal instead of wheat, because it 
cost less, and sincere efforts were made to relieve the 
general distress. But it was all like a drop in the 
bucket so long as a costly war was going on; and at 
length the king brought his proud mind to beg for 
peace. 

By this time the allies had become so haughty in 
their demands that they rejected all reasonable pro- 
posals, and insisted on such as Louis felt compelled to 
refuse. Among other things they required that he 
should himself drive his grandson from the throne of 
Spain, by force of arms if necessary. " No," said he. 



248 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

" if I must fight let it be ag-ainst my enemies, and not 
against my own flesh and blood." He made an appeal 
to the people of France asking for their help, and an 
enthusiastic reply came from all classes urging him to 
refuse the insulting proposition. 

Fortune now began to take a turn in his favor. His 
generals gained some brilliant victories, and drove the 
Emperor's son out of Spain. The English quarreled 
among themselves at home, and recalled their greatest 
general, Marlborough, on account of his politics. 
Finally the long wished-f or peace was signed at Utrecht 
in 1713, and ended the war of the Spanish Succession 
— a desolatino- struof-crle between rival kino-s, to decide 
which of them should impose a ruler over a foreign 
people who were never asked to make their own 
choice. As if kings were drovers and their subjects 
cattle ! Louis had nothins; to show for this dreadful 
war of twelve years but an empty purss, an enormous 
public debt, and the miserable satisfaction of having 
succeeded in establishing: his errandson in Madrid, 
while the Pyrenees were still as high and ragged as 
ever. 

His last years were very sad. One after another his 
family were borne to the grave, so that before his turn 
came he was left almost alone. When he was seventy- 
three years old his only lawful son, the Grand-Dauphin^ 
died suddenly of small-pox. He was a man of no 
great mark, but his oldest son, becoming Dauphin in 
his turn, promised the French a better king than they 
had had since Henry the Fourth. This was the Duke 
of Burgundy, whose character seems to have been a 
union of all the virtues. His instructor was the celebra- 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV. 249 

ted Fenelon, who wrote for him the story of Teleraaque, 
so well known to the school children of a few 
years ago. His wife was the lovely Adelaide of Savoy, 
whose charming manners, kind heart and unvarying- 
good temper and spriglitliness had made her the idol 
of the palace and the delight of the old king. 

"When she went out at night to balls or other court 
festivities Louis always expected her to make him a 
visit before going to bed, when she would perch on 
the arm of his chair and rattle off the news of the 
evening for his amusement. A few months after the 
Grand-Dauphin's death this fascinating young princess 
died suddenly of a kind of measles; her husband, 
utterly broken-hearted, was laid in the grave six days 
afterwarcj, and their oldest son, the third dauphin in 
succession, died a fortnight later. Two years after 
this, the youngest son of the Grand-Dauphin, also died 
very suddenly; and Louis the Fourteenth at seventy- 
six years old, \^^as left with no other descendants than 
his grandson, the young king of Spain, and his great 
grandson, a sickly boy of four years old, second son of 
the Duke of Burgundy. In another year his own long 
life came to an end, and this feeble youth succeeded 
him as Louis tlie Fifteenth. 

When the king found that he had but a short time 
to live he called his great-grandson to his bedside, and 
in the presence of the courtiers who crowded around, 
made him an address which the prince afterwards had 
framed, and hung up over the head of his bed, though 
unfortunately it never influenced his conduct. 

" My child," said the dying man, "you are going to 
be a great king. Remember your duty to God; try 



250 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to keep peace with your neighbors. I have loved 
war too much ; do not be like me in that, nor in the 
useless spending of money. Try to improve the 
condition of your people, which I have been so unfor- 
tunate as not to be able to do. Darling, I give you 
my blessing with all my heart." Hearing some of 
his servants sobbing, he said, " What are you crying 
for? Did you think that I was immortal?" He 
remarked to Madame de Maintenon, " It is not so hard 
to die as I thought it would be." When he was 
told that prayers were offered in the churches for his 
life, he said, " That is not worth while. It is my 
salvation that needs praying for." And thus passed 
away another in the long procession of kings, each 
possessing great powers for good and evil, who so 
used those powers that we come to their last hours with 
a sense of relief. 

" I loved war too much," the king had said on his 
death -bed. It was too late now for his people to bene- 
fit by the discovery. His reign of seventy-two years 
had brought them so low that instead of sorrow there 
was open rejoicing among them at his death. If he 
had set an example to his successor of wise and just 
government, instead of leaving him some cheap good 
advice, France might have been saved the woful mis- 
eries which the eighteenth century was to see it suffer. 

The age of Louis the Fourteenth is graced by many 
great names. Poets, dramatists, painters and sculp- 
tors, distinguished preachers, elegant essayists, and 
men of science in almost every department, shed a 
lustre over the period. 

The large-hearted Fenelon said of Louis, " God 



TO THE DEATH OF LOUIS XIV. 251 

will surely have compassion upon a prince beset 
from his youth by flatterers." One incident will show 
you the nature of his early training. While he was a 
boy, the Prince of Conde, one of the most distin- 
guished men in his kingdom, entered the room where 
he was studying with his tutor. Louis, with a natural 
feeling of respect and politeness, rose, and began to 
converse with his visitor bareheaded. One of the 
persons present gravely took the young king's hat 
from the chair where he had placed it, and presented 
it to him. The prince, noticing this, observed, " That 
is quite right; your Majesty should be covered when 
you converse with your subjects. You do us sufficient 
honor by a bow." What could one expect from a 
youth brought up in such a school as this, but bound- 
less self-sufficiency and arrogance? 

There was one person living during this reign, who, 
though not historically important, is so often men- 
tioned that it is worth while to give him a place here. 
This is " The Man in the Iron Mask," whose face was 
never seen even by his jailors, and who was kept in 
prison many years and finally died there. The mask, 
by the way, was not iron, but black velvet, fastened 
on by steel springs. For a long time this mysterious 
personage was supposed to have been either a twin- 
brother of Louis or some other highly connected 
individual; but more recent research makes it likely 
that he was only a foreign ambassador who had had 
the misfortune to offend the "Grand Monarque." 
We can hardly believe it now, but it is none the less 
sadly true that many persons were thrown into prison 
without trial and often without the least information 



252 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to their friends as to what had become of them. They 
saw nobody, could write no letters, and often died in 
their wretched dungeons or cachots^ (places of hiding)^ 
apparently forgotten by the whole world. 

In looking over the one hundred and five years 
which elapsed from the accession of Louis the Thir- 
teenth to the death of his son, we see a great change 
for the worse in France. Henry and Sully left it 
rich and prosperous; Louis the Fourteenth left it 
overwhelmed with debt, its trade and agriculture 
depressed by causeless wars, its people so accustomed 
to despotism that they had forgotton the meaning of 
freedom. All the splendid palaces the country could 
contain would not make up for such a loss as that. 




CHAPTER XXVI, 

LOUIS xY. 1715-1774. 

HAVE seen somewhere a picture of the little 
Kino- Louis the Fifteenth as he was led out 
upon the balcony of his palace to be shown to 
the people after his great-grandfather's death. He 
looks almost like a baby, though he was five years old 
at that time, and in the picture he has a purple sash 
round his waist, of which the ends are held by two 
ladies to keep him from tumbling down. There was 
not a person nearly enough related to him, according 
to court notions, to lead him by the hand. 

Poor little fellow! It is sad to see him so lonelv, so 



LOUIS XV. 253 

"great" and so helpless. The late king had made a 
will appointing a council of Regency to govern during 
his minority, but this will was treated like so much 
waste paper, and the Duke of Orleans, one of the 
worst men in the kino-dom, was made Reo-ent. He 
was absolutely without principle, and led so shameful 
a private life that it would have been impossible to 
find any one to set a worse example to the young king. 

The Regent had a great desire to be popular, and 
began his reign by opening the prison-doors to num- 
bers of the miserable people shut up in cachots, many 
of whom had been confined there for offences now for- 
gotten. Some of them never knew why they had 
been imprisoned at all. One v/as a traveler from 
Italy who had been arrested and thrown into prison 
on the very day of his arrival in Paris, thirty-five years 
before; it was thought it must have been a mistake! 
Such are the results of trusting any man with power 
for which he is not responsible to his fellow-country- 
men. 

This was a good beginning, but the next acts of the 
Regent were not so cr-editable to him. A Chamber 
of Justice (so called) soon became a court of frightful 
tyranny. Under pretence of exposing frauds com- 
mitted against the government, a general prosecution 
was beo'un acfainst contractors and others, in which 
torture was frequently used to make the victim confess 
a crime and give up his money. To make sure of being 
arrested, a man needed only to be rich and outside of 
the circle of the court. Many people were known even 
to commit suicide to escape the grasp of the law. 

All this did little good to the finances, for, as usual, 



254 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the rich and noble contrived to seize a great part of 
the money thus gained, so that it could not be applied 
to the use of the country. The national revenue had 
been exhausted for three years ahead by mortgaging 
the taxes; that is, getting loans from rich people, to be 
collected by them from the taxes of the next three 
years, and there were no more lenders to be found. 
Then the old plan was resorted to of debasing the 
coin. People were required to bring their money to 
the mint and to receive back new coins containing 
only four-fifths of the precious metal, and these were 
to pass current for the whole value. 

It was daring the regency of Orleans that the strange 
commercial delusion called the " Mississippi Scheme" 
arose in France. This scheme was contrived by a 
Scotchman named John Law, who thought he was going 
to make the country and himself immensely rich by it. 
The Regent, distracted by the need of money, eagerly 
grasped at the idea. Law's first plan was only that the 
government should issue a great quantity of paper mon- 
ey, which is merely a promise to pay gold and silver at 
some later time, and is very convenient if the gold 
and silver are ready to be paid when that time comes, 
which was not the case in France under the Regency. 

At first the success of the plan was something won- 
derful. The government paid all its debts promptly, 
(in paper); money (so called) was plenty, and every 
body felt rich. Before this joyful state of feeling 
had time to cool ofi^, Law got up a company in connec- 
tion with the Bank, to trade in Louisiana, which had 
in the last reign been taken possession of by France. 
It was reported that there was enough gold and silver 



LOUIS XV. 255 

on tKe banks of the Mississippi to furnish the world, 
and a stock company was formed w^hich gave people 
who put their money into it the right to a certain pro 
portion of the profits. The amount required for the 
enterprise M^as divided into shares, and the person who 
could buy the most of these shares would, according to 
the plan, be the richest in the end, and so everybody, 
from princes to chambermaids, rushed to subscribe to 
the stock. 

By-and-by there began to be whispers that all was 
not rio-ht. Emio-rants were sent over to the land of 
promise, and the city of New Orleans was founded 
and named after the Regent, but the ships laden with 
gold did not appear in the harbors. Instead of them 
came letters from the emigrants telling of cruel neg- 
lect, disappointment and suffering. Some far-sighted 
people began to dispose privately of their shares and 
bank-notes. The Prince of Conti, a member of the 
Royal family, and one of the richest men in the king- 
dom, forced the bank to redeem his notes, and secured 
three cart-loads of coin. Soon there was as great a 
rush to sell Mississippi shares as there had been to buy 
them. Then the bank declared itself unable to pay 
the cash for its notes, and the nation was bankrupt. 
Words fail to give an idea of the distress produced 
by this fearful blow. Thousands who had been well 
off were reduced to beggary. The price of provisions 
became so high that multitudes actually died of starv- 
ation. The scheme which was to have paid off the 
public debt increased it by nearly a hundred millions. 
Law, who had at least the merit of believinof in his 
own plans, and had brought a large fortune to Franco 



256 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

with hiin, fled from the country, taking scarcely 
eno .gh money to supply him with the necessaries of 
life. He died in poverty, maintaining to the last that 
his ideas were correct, and that only unavoidable mis- 
fortune had prevented him from realizing his highest 
hopes. 

The eight years of misrule under the fickle and 
indolent Recent, and Cardinal Dubois his infamous 
minister, were now drawino- to an end. Both these 
men, worn out with dissipation, died in the year when 
the young king was declared of age to govern for 
himself. A distinguished writer says of the new king, 
" There was nothing royal about him but his face." 
He was handsome, cold-hearted, fond of low pleasures, 
and utterly averse to books^ as well as to all other sorts 
of learning; his own pleasure w^as his whole world. 
As for caring anything about the well-being of his 
subjects, we cannot imagine him to have ever done it 
for a moment. Though Louis was no student, he had 
teachers, as other children have. During ■ the 
time when he had lessons to learn, as etiquette did 
not permit the royal youth to receive the whippings 
w4iich were then thought necessary for children who 
would not study, his governess hired a poor man's son 
to study with him and take the whippings for him 
whenever he deserved them. 

After the death of the Duke of Orleans his place 
was filled by the Duke of Bourbon, a man who had 
all the wickedness of Orleans, without his talent. For, 
three years he misgoverned the unhappy people 
of France, debasing the coin, levying enormous taxes 
which were squandered in follies, and making himself 



LOUIS XV. 257 



odious to rich as well as poor. His most important 
publlic act was bringing about a marriage between 
Louis and Maria Leczynski, the daughter of a deposed 
king of Poland, who was living on cijarity in Germany. 

The new queen was amiable and rather pretty, but 
had little force of character, and never obtained any 
influence over her boy-husband, who soon began to 
neglect her for other women, according to the fashion 
of French kings. If we were to imagine the new queen 
as journeying towards Paris from her obscure retreat in 
Germany over the beautiful hard roads which now 
make France such a delightful country to travel in, it 
would be quite a mistake. A writer of the time says 
of her arrival, " Never shall I forget the horror of the 
miseries we were enduring in France when the queen 
came. * * Everybody was thinking of the harvest, 
which it had not been possible to get in on account of 
the continual rains; the poor farmer was watching 
anxiously for a dry moment; meanwhile, the district 
was beaten with many a scourge. The peasants had 
been sent to prepare the roads over which the queen 
was to pass, but they were only the worse for it, so 
that her majesty was often within an ace of drowning; 
the attendants pulled her from the carriage by the 
strong arm as best they might. In several places she 
and her suite were swimming in the water which spread 
everywhere in spite of all the pains that had been 
taken with the roads by a tyrannical ministry." 

The misconduct of the Duke of Bourbon finally pro- 
cured his dismissal from office, and Louis turned over 
the government to his old tutor, the abbe Fleury, who 
was made Cardinal, that he might be noble enough 
17 



258 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

to have the honor of directino; the kino;'s affairs. He 
was then seventy-three years old, and might have been 
thought about ready to leave the scene; but he lived 
to be ninety, hard at work all the while. The early 
years of his administration are the brightest spot in that 
dreadful eighteenth century. Wishing to keep the 
peace at home, he did not dare to tax the lands of the 
privileged classes, but he practised such strict economy 
in all parts of the public business, and even in the 
king's own household, that no part of the revenue was 
wasted. The coin was raised to its true standard, com- 
merce and agriculture began to flourish, new colonies 
v/cre sent to the far distant America and India, and 
France had a breathing-spell in which she seemed to 
be resting after all her troubles. A fair chance 
was all that she ever needed. 

The few wars which the economical Cardinal Fleury 
allowed his country to be dragged into under him, were 
not conducted with much spirit or good judgment until 
Marshal Saxe, a famous soldier, came to serve in his 
array. At the battle of Fontenoy he was victorious over 
the English, and had some other successes which re- 
stored the good name of France. Over his tomb in 
Strasburg a monument is st'dl standing, erected, as the 
inscription upon it says, by Louis XV., "the author 
and witness of his victories." A very easy way this 
to be the author of a victory! 

It was after this campaign that Louis acquired the 
extremely ill-deserved name of " The Well-Beloved " 
— "Xe hien aimey He was very il), and professed to 
repent of the bad life he had led — perhaps he did 
repent of it when he thought he was going to die — 



LOUIS XV. 259 



and his people showed the wildest joy when they heard 
that he was getting well. " If he dies," they cried, 
" it will be because he went to fight for us! " Louis's 
cold heart was moved by their aiFection, and he asked 
with some feeling: " AVhat have I ever done for my 
people that they should love me so?" but he did not 
ask, "what can I do hereafter?" It was the last 
gleam of enthusiastic loyalty. After that there were 
no more rejoicings until the day of his death. 

Durjno- the course of this war a srreat struo-p-le 
had taken place between the English and French 
in India. Thanks to the skill of the French general 
Dupleix and the bravery of the French troops, their 
nation came off with the highest honors. When 
peace was made in 1748 by the treaty of Aix-la-Cha- 
pelle, it was expected that France would demand some 
advantages in return for all her losses. Louis, how- 
ever, remarked that he made war like a prince, not like 
a merchant; and all that his country had to show for 
a bloody strife of seven years was a navy almost de- 
stroyed, commerce ruined and an enormous public 
debt created. 

The governors of provinces had taken advantage 
of the weakness which accompanied the good Fleury's 
great age to oppress the people in the old way, and 
he himself had imposed a new burden on them called 
the corvee.) which was an obligation to keep the public 
highways in order. This was to be done, not by the 
nobles who traveled over them and whose lands they 
improved, not by the rich merchants whose goods were 
carried on them from place to place, but by the laboring 
men — the peasants — already crushed by their taxes, 



260 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

who were required to work on them without pay for a 
certain number of days in the year. Forced work on 
public buildings was also part of this imposition. As 
we read of such things, we wonder that the poor 
wretches did not rise in a body and revenge themselves 
on their oppressors, as in the days of the Jacquerie j but 
their time had not yet come. 




OHAPTEB XXVIL 

THE END OP A BAD LIFE. 1748-1774. 

pANCE had a little rest between the peace of 
Aix-la-Chape.Ue and the breaking out in 
1756 of the Seven Years' War — the same 
which is called in American history the French and 
Indian War. A country naturally so rich does not 
take long to recover its strength if it is only let alone; 
and though the taxes were heavy, the general prosper- 
ity kept on increasing in spite of them. The colonies 
in America, especially those in the West Indies, were 
beginning to be profitable. Those who looked at the 
country only from the outside thought that all was 
going well. 

But the king — what shall we say of him? The less 
said about him the better. During the war he had 
shown some gleams of courage and spirit; now these 
were all gone, and he gave himself up entirely to a 
woman named Madame de Pompadour, who in fact 
ruled France for twenty years. All public business 



THE END OF A BAD LIFE. 261 

went on in her boudoir; the first people in the land 
were candidates for her favor, since nothing could be 
got from the king without her influence; even 
generals in the army and bishops in the church were 
appointed by her means. What kind of generals and 
bishops they Avere likely to be can be easily imagined. 

The expenditure of the public money became 
frio-htful. The favorite was allowed to draw bills " at 
sight" upon the treasury, signed by her with the 
king's name, for whatever amounts she chose; it was 
the business of the king's ministers to pay these bills 
when they were presented, and to find money for the 
purpose by borrowing or by taxes. To try to please 
the worn-out king, Madame de Pompadour built one 
costly pleasure-house after another, decorating them 
according to her own fancy, and squandering such 
countless sums of money on them as exceeded even 
the wasteful expenditures of Louis the Fourteenth. 
If her patronage had done the fine arts any good we 
might have had more patience with her, but the things 
she delighted in were so ugly that the age she lived 
in has been called " the era of bad taste." 

In the midst of the disorders which were the natural 
consequence of such a state of things, a man named 
Damiens tried to assassinate the king by stabbing him 
with a pen-knife. The blow scarcely drew blood, but 
the king was greatly alarmed, thinking that the weapon 
might have been poisoned. He had the presence of 
mind to point out the assassin, whom he recognised 
by his being the only man in the crowd with a hat on; 
then went home and took to his bed, sending post- 
haste for his physician and his confessor. When the 



262 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

wound was discovered to be a mere scratch, he 
troubled himself no longer about the state of his soul, 
but went on in his old way. All the tortures that 
could be applied failed to draw from the murderer the 
name of any one who had knowledge of his intention, 
and he was executed as Ravaillac had been, according; 
to the barbarous law of the times. Holes were torn in 
his flesh with red-hot pincers, and then melted lead 
was poured into the wounds. These tortures were 
continued for four hours, the executioners being careful 
not to touch any part that could affect his life. 
When it was plain that he could bear no more, 
his hands and feet were tied to four horses, which 
were then driven in different directions, tearing his 
body to pieces. 

If we were not told it on good authority we could 
not believe that all this was done in an open square, 
while the windows and balconies overlooking it were 
crowded with " noble " lords and ladies, delighting in 
the spectacle. 

During the time we have described, the Seven Years' 
War had begun, (1756). To the astonishment of all 
Europe, Louis joined himself with Austria, which had 
for more than two hundred years been the enemy of 
France. The secret of this was that the Empress- 
Queen, Maria Theresa, had written a letter with her 
own hand, (a rare honor among kings and queens), 
to Madame de Pompadour, in which she addressed 
her as " cousin," as if she had been really a queen : 
and this so flattered her vanity that she made Louis 
take the part of Austria against England and Prussia. 

As usual, we will omit here the details of- the war. 



THE END OF A BAD LIFE. 263 

We have read in American history the part that most 
interests us; the expedition against Fort Du Quesne 
by Braddock and Washington, the taking of Quebec 
by Wolfe, and the driving away from their homes of 
the simple-minded j^easants of Acadia, (now Nova 
Scotia), by the English. These incidents are much 
more interesting to us than what went on in Europe 
during that cruel struggle which ended in taking away 
from France almost all her possessions in America 
except the wilderness west of the Mississippi. For 
her it was a most disgraceful peace. England got the 
best of everything that was to be given away, in Europe, 
Asia, Africa and America. Spain was obliged to give 
up several rich colonies, while Austria and Prussia, 
who had lost, between them, three hundred and twenty 
thousand men and millions of money, remained jDre- 
cisely as they were before the war. 

This treaty was even more distasteful to the French 
nation tl\an that of Aix-la-Chapelle had been, and from 
this time they looked upon the king with open con- 
tempt. The feeling of loyalty was dead in their hearts, 
and they only sighed for the time when the figure that 
disfjraced the throne should be removed from it. 
Louis had a succession of ministers who have been 
compared to the figures in a kaleidoscope, so rapidly 
did they shift and vary according to the turns of 
court favor. Of these, the only one who can be men- 
tioned with honor was the Duke de Choiseul : he, 
though he made some mistakes, seems really to have 
had the good of his country at heart. He could not 
stop the river of corruption nor revive the dead body 
of the public credit, but he did what he could, and the 



264 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

French grovernment became more respectable than it 
had been since the early days of Fleury. 

Among the events of those troubled times, one which 
must not be be passed over, was the suppression in 
France of the famous order of the Jesuits, or Roman 
Catholic " Society of Jesus." It would be impossible 
to explain, in our small space, ail the causes which led 
to this result; but Choiseul was the chief mover in it. 
Their property was taken away from them, and their 
society declared to be at an end in 1773. 

While Choiseul w^as at the head of affairs, France 
gained possession of a piece of territory that she has 
has since been very proud of. This was a small rocky 
island in the Mediterranean, southeast of France, called 
Corsica. In former times it had belonged to Genoa, 
in Italy; but being very harshly treated by the Geno- 
ese, the Corsicans had rebelled and were now strug- 
gling for independence. Genoa, despairing of con- 
quering these brave islanders, sold her claim, such as 
it was, to France. In vain did the Corsicans protest 
against this, saying that they were not to be bought 
and sold like a flock of sheep sent to market. In vain 
did they make at the battle of Golo a rampart of 
their dead and wounded together, behind which 
they could reload their guns. After three years' fight- 
ing the French succeeded in putting down the re- 
bellion, and two months after the final submission 
of Corsica a child was born there who will appear in 
our history under the name of Napoleon Bonaparte. 

Previous to this time a remarkable series of deaths 
had occurred in the ro3'-al family, which remind us of 
the last years of Louis the Fourteenth, The Dauphin, 



THE END OF A BAD LIFE. 265 

a man in every respect the opj30site of his father, lived 
a pure and virtuous lite in the company of hii mother, 
Maria Leczynski, and his wife and children, as distinct 
from that of the vile court as if they had been on an- 
other continent. This oasis in the desert was broken 
up by the death of the Dauphin, his wife and his 
mother, all within a short time, leavino; his three sons 
to grow up without the tender care which had watched 
over their infancy. These sons were afterward Louis 
the Sixteenth, Louis the Eighteenth, and Charles the 
Tenth. 

It seems to bring the events we are observing very 
near to us when we know that the youngest of these 
brothers lived until 1836, a time within the memory 
of many of our parents. 

Madame de Pompadour was dead, but her place was 
soon supplied by an infamous woman whom Louis made 
Countess Du Barry. The Duke de Choiseul, Louis's 
prime minister, remonstrated with the king against 
this new scandal, and Du Barry never rested until she 
had procured his disgrace — for that is what it was con- 
sidered to 1)6 dismissed irom the royal council. A 
" lettre de cachet " requested Choiseul to retire to his 
estate in the country, where he spent the rest of his 
life in the company of intelligent and cultivated peo- 
ple, and was happier tlian he had ever been while 
breathing the impure air of the court. 

These " lettres de cachet " were orders under the 
king's seal, {cachet being the French for seal), for the 
imprisonment of some person accused or suspected of 
a crime. They were introduced by Louis the Elev- 
enth, who thought nothing of shutting up his subjects 



266 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

in dungeons without a trial by law, whenever they 
offended him. Cardinal Richelieu made ffreat use of 
this privilege. It is related that a distinguished gen- 
eral of Louis the Thirteenth was shut up for twelve 
years in the Bastille without ever being able to find 
out the reason. At the end of the first seven years 
the king said to Richelieu that it was against his con- 
science to keep any longer in prison a man like the 
Marshal de Bassompierre, against whom no charge 
could be made, and that he must let him go. The 
Cardinal replied coolly that so many things had passed 
through his mind since Bassompierre's imprisonment 
that he really could not remember what was the cause 
of it. Whereupon the Marshal remained in close con- 
finement for five years lono-er, not beino: allowed even 
to see his family, until the death of the Cardinal pro- 
cured his release. That Louis the Fourteenth was 
guilty of the use of lettres de cachet is proved hy the 
number of prisoners released from the cachots when 
the Duke of Orleans came into office. But the crown- 
ing shame of it was reserved for the days of Louis the 
Fifteenth. When all other knOwn ways of getting 
money were exhausted, blank lettres de cachet were 
sold to any one who would pay for them, and in this 
way any rich man could get revenge ujDon an enemy, 
or any extravagant man could dispose of a trouble- 
some creditor. One of Louis's ministers is said to have 
given away many thousands of these orders, merely 
to make himself popular. 

After the retirement of Choiseul comes a long line 
of ministers, each with some new plan for extorting 
money from the people, of whom one, the Abbe 



THE END OF A BAD LIFE. 267 

Terray, said they were a sponge, made to be squeezed. 
This man, with the consent of the king, made a horri- 
ble arrangement called the "Facte de Famine," — 
famine-bargain. First of all the farmers w^ere forbid- 
den to send their grain to other countries for sale. 
This made the price* very low in France, where great 
quantities were thrown on the merchants' hands 
because there was no sale for it. Terray then bought 
up all that he could get at this low rate, sent it out of 
the country in government vessels, and then had it 
brought back again and sold at an enormous price. 
The 'king was a partner in the profits of this enter- 
prise. If any indignant citizen dared to urter a word 
of complaint, a lettre de cachet promptly sent him to 
the Bastille. 

This is only one among hundreds of such outrages 
that might be mentioned, but which it is useless to 
dwell upon. It was like pouring water into a sieve to 
try to fill the ever-grasping hand of Du Barry.. The 
king, sunk in sloth, permitted those about him to do 
as they pleased so long as his pleasures were not inter- 
fered with; and when warned that his country was 
on the very edge of a volcano, would laugh and say, 
"Never mind; it will last out my time!" And his 
favorites echoed, " After us may come the Deluge." 
After them the deluge did come, a deluge of blood. 

The condition of the peasants daily grew worse, 
though this seems hardly possible. The poorest were 
really serfs, bought and sold with the land they lived 
on, for they had no power to change their place. 
Whole tracts of land were turned into game preserves 
where animals ran wild, certain always to destroy the 



2G8 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

crops of the poor man whose land lay in the way. 
" Protected " hares often ate a fifth of what he raised. 
The noble might, (and often did), forbid him to plough 
his ground for fear of disturbing the young game, or 
to manure it properly for fear of destroying its flavor, 
but the tax-o^atherer came round as usual. Four times 
a year each family was compelled to buy a certain 
quantity of salt, whether they wished it or not, that 
the gabelle might help to fill the king's empty purse. 
The corvee ruined thousands of farmers who had to 
give their labor on roads and bridges when they were 
called upon for it, though their crops might be perish- 
ing for want of attention. The king's business al- 
ways came first. 

During these many years of despotism, the Parlia- 
ments alone, the ancient courts of law, preserved some 
sort of independence. They had many a struggle 
with the king in which to the last they kept their self- 
respect, until, finding that they could not be controlled, 
Louis abolished them altogether, appointing in their 
place bodies of men who he thought could be more 
easily managed. 

Towards the close of this reign occurred the first of 
those disgraceful " partitions " of Poland among 
Russia, Austria and Prussia, which the other powers 
in Europe tamely looked on and allowed. France 
made no protest, and the king observed, as if he had 
been an indifferent spectator, that had Ohoiseul been 
at the head of his ministry such an occurrence could 
not have taken place. 

For a lono; time nothino- had been so much desired 
in France as the death of the king. At last the wished- 



LOUIS XVI. 269 



for moment came. After a reign of nearly fifty-nine 
years, Louis the Fifteenth was about to leave the 
world, and the only fear of his people was that he 
might get well again. The disease was malignant 
small-pox; and though his daughters had never had it, 
they shut themselves up in the loathsome sick-room 
to nurse him, and remained there till all was over. 
Then the corpse, forced into a coffin too small for it, 
was hurried to St. Denis at full gallop, amidst the 
scoffs and insults of the populace. 

"A terrible noise, like thunder," says a writer of 
the time, was heard in the palace as soon as Louis's 
death was announced. It was the crowd of courtiers, 
hurrying Avith all their might to congratulate the new 
king and queen. 




CHAPTER XXVIIL 

LOUIS XVI. 1774-1793. 

HEN Louis the Sixteenth and his young wife 
were told of the old King's death, they fell on 
their knees, crying, " Oh, God, help us! We 
are too young to reign." Young or old, it would have 
made little difference. With such a legacy of misery 
and confusion as they fell heirs to, anjl their imperfect 
education, so little fitting them for the part they were 
to play in life, it was impossible that they should not 
fail. 

Louis had been married, four years before, to Marie 
Antoinette, daughter of Maria Theresa of Austria. 



270 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

lie was now twenty years old, his queen a year younger. 
During the days of his grandfather's worst degra- 
dation, after the Dauphin's death, he had been called 
" Louis le .Desire'''' — " the Desired." He had had a good 
education as far as books went, but had never been 
tauffht the duties of a kino;. These he had to feel out 
for himself, and a book of " Reflections " written by 
him, shows us how hard he struggled to do his duty and 
act for the best interests of his people. 

Marie Antoinette had been brought up even worse 
than her husband. Married at fifteen, she was ignorant 
of everything but how to appear to advantage in society. 
She was thoughtless, extravagant and self-willed, and 
had not that fine quality called tact., which would have 
enabled her, with her handsome face and charming 
manners, to make friends with all classes of people. 
As it was, she offended the stiff old ladies in her train 
by ridiculing the tedious etiquette of their court, and 
disgusted the common people by her want of sympathy 
for them and by her frivolous amusements and occupa- 
tions. Even the most stupid of Louis's subjects were 
beginning to feel that they had some rights of their 
own, though few people had yet been found bold 
enough to say so. When some one asked the king by 
what quality he would like to be known, he said that if he 
could have his choice, he would like to be called " Louis 
the Severe." Poor Louis ! he was only the In- 
consistent. Timid and hesitating when something 
of importance was to be decided, — obstinate in the 
wrong place and yielding in the wrong place, — scarce- 
ly any misfortune could have happened to him so 
great as to be born a king. 



LOUIS XVI. 271 



Although he was extremely popular in the beginning 
of his reign, before people knew much about him, he 
soon lost favor by his unkingly ways and appearance. 
Instead of the fine features and lofty gait of his grand- 
father, he had a heavy, rather vulgar-looking face, a 
shuffling step, (a great disadvantage to a man in any 
station), a slow, hesitating way of speaking, and an 
awkward manner. He might have had all these combin- 
ed with sound judgment and discretion, but he did 
not. They were only the signs of a weak and vacil- 
lating, though upright soul. Louis made a bad choice 
of a first minister. Reappointed the Count de Maure- 
pas, a foolish old courtier, with a head full of antiquated 
notions instead of the new thoughts and ideas which 
were gaining ground in France every day. A better 
selection was that of the Minister of Finance, Turgot, 
w4io was in money matters the ablest statesman the 
eighteenth century had yet seen. 

His motto was, "No more borrowing, no bankrupt- 
cies, no new taxes." He wished to abolish the odious 
corvee^ and in its place to lay a very moderate tax on 
land, which w^ould bring the burden of public improve- 
ments where it belonged, on those who were to profit 
by them. This excellent regulation was violently op- 
posed by the land-owners, who declared that it 
would ruin them, and the Parliament refused to reg- 
ister it. The king, who approved of Turgot's plans, 
and would gladly have seen them carried out, held 
a "bed of justice''' and compelled the court to reg- 
ister the law, but it was done with sullen anger, 
which showed that a storm was comino-. It mi^ht 
have been possible, even then, to save the country 



272 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

if the " privileged classes " could have been per- 
suaded to do their share towards it, but they were 
blinded bv mistaken self-interest, and rushed headlons: 
to their ruin. 

We have not space to tell of all the wise measures 
proposed by Turgot and resisted by the country as if 
he had been its worst enemy, even the very people he 
was trying to help often taking part against him. 
The queen, who did not know what self-denial meant, 
disliked him because he insisted on reducing the 
expenses of the royal household. The king, though 
he had promised to support Turgot in all his plans, 
weakly gave way in the face of so much opposition; 
and this admirable minister, the only man who could 
have brought order out of the chaos which prevailed 
in France, was abruptly dismissed. His friend 
Malesherbes, another wise and patriotic man to whom 
Louis had given a high position, saw how useless all 
their efforts were, and also resigned his place. 

The defeat of such men was a great triumph for 
the wealthy classes, which included not only the 
nobility but many merchants and others whose gains 
would have been lessened by the free-trade that 
Turgot tried to establish between different parts of 
France. All attempts at reform were now abandoned. 
Louis invited M. Necker,* a celebrated Swiss banker, 
to take charge of the finances. 

But Necker had not the boldness of Turgot. lie did 
not interfere with the privileges of the great lords or 
the wealthy merchants, but he was successful in raising 

*Jltf. before French names, stands for Monsieur. 



LOUIS XVL 273 



new loans, and he abolished about six hundred useless 
offices, making a great saving to the government. 
Durino: the whole time that he continued in office he 
refused to accept any salary whatever, that he might 
with more assurance reduce the salaries paid to others. 

Ever since the death of Louis the Fourteenth 
there had been in France a set of men who were con- 
stantly writing and talking about freedom, and trying 
to make people understand what a bad system they 
were iivino- under. These men called themselves 
philosophers; and though in the degraded reign of 
Louis the Fifteenth many of them had learned to scoff 
at religion and despise morality, their ideas about free 
government were just, and were silently preparing 
people's minds for the great change that was to come 
before the century closed. 

The American Revolution, which had broken out 
just before Necker was called into office, had also a 
great effect in France. It showed that it was possible 
to rebel against even a very strong government, and, 
together with the doctrines of the philosophers, it 
set the French nation to thinking. Matters were 
brouo;ht to a crisis when our Conm-ess sent the vener- 
able Benjamin Franklin and two other envoys to Paris 
to ask for help for the patriots. 

Louis did not wish a war with England, and Necker 
was opposed to spending money unnecessarily; but 
the French people were so wild with their new enthu- 
siasm for liberty that the king did not venture to resist 
them. He sent some ships of war to this country under 
the command of his best officers, and in 1778 acknowl- 
edged the independence of the United States. Before 



18 



274 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

this the generous La Fayette had thrown himself and 
his fortune into our cause as a volunteer; and the 
names of the French commanders, De Grasse, D'Es- 
taing and Rochambeau, are familiar to the readers of 
American history. The support of France was very 
useful to us in our great struggle, and America has 
always remained grateful for it. 

Franklin set an example of true republican sim- 
plicity to the astonished court of Versailles. In the 
midst of the curled and powdered nobles, with their 
coats covtired with spangles and embroidery, and their 
three-cornered hats carried jauntily under the arm, it 
was refreshing to see the old American with his long, 
unpowdered hair, his comfortable fur cap, and a drab 
coat such as a farmer might wear when he took his 
grain to market. They admired him as they would 
have done some new and curious animal, and the ladies 
made a great pet of him. This was not exactly in his 
line, but as he was satisfied with having succeeded in 
his mission, he endured it with a good grace. 

The acknowledgment of American independence 
led immediately to a war between England and France. 
It is not necessary for us to enter into the particulars 
of this war. It is enough to say that when peace was 
made between the three nations at Versailles, in 1783, 
(at the close of our Revolutionary war), France came 
off with honor, and the disgrace of the Peace of Paris, 
at the end of the Seven Years' War, was in some 
degree wiped out. 

At home she had nothing to be proud of. The 
extravagance of the queen and her friends, which 
Louis had not the energy to restrain nor Necker the 



LOUIS XVL 275 



power to reduce, kept the treasury empty in spite of 
all that the Q-reat financier could do. No matter what 
the minister provided, more was sure to be spent. 
He did not, as Turgot had done, go to the root of the 
matter by taxing all in proportion to their means. 
But even with his half-measures he offended the upper 
classes so that they made his position very uncomfort- 
able; and when the imbecile Maurepas denied him a 
place in the state-council because he was a Protestant, 
he could bear it no longer. He resigned his office and 
went back to Switzerland. 

Through all the distresses of the country, and the 
perplexities of the king, Marie Antoinette and the 
court pursued their round of gayeties for which the 
nation was paying so dearly. As the queen grew older 
she freed herself from the excessive restraints of eti- 
quette, which were so irksome to her, and her motives 
were misrepresented by those who had a sioite against 
her. Of these there were, unfortunately, too many, 
for she had taken no pains to make herself loved by 
the people, though she was most gracious to those 
immediately about her. Her diversions, too, were 
always of a costly character. Among others, she had 
what she called an English farm, fitted up near Ver- 
sailles, into which some millions of francs of the peo- 
ple's money were poured, that she might amuse her- 
self according to her fancy. This was called the Little 
Trianon, to distino-uish it from another called the 
Great Trianon, built by Louis the Fourteenth. The 
king's brothers formed part of this court circle, to be 
supported at the expense of the nation. The elder of 
these, the Count de Provence, who afterward became 



276 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



Louis the Eighteenth, had the most ability of any of 
the family; the younger, the Count d' Artois, after- 
ward Charles the Tenth, was dissipated, frivolous and 
wrong-headed, while the enormous debts which he 
contracted, without any other means of paying them 
than by new impositions on the people, showed his 
utter selfishness and want of principle. 

The King in the meantime was helpless and 
uneasy. Although economical in his personal expenses, 
he could not (or did not) prevent the thousands of 
court parasites from feeding upon the public purse and 
drawing every year immense pensions for doing 



nothing. 



Louis was extremely fond of hunting and 



of using locksmith's tools; these were the only 
amusements he cared for. When he could shut 
himself up for a whole day at a time, working away at 
locks and keys like a laborer who had a family to 
provide for, he was happy; but when M. Necker came 
to talk to him about public afPairs he became restless 
and confused. He knew that everything was going 
wrong, but not feeling in himself the power to set 
it right, he shuffled out of all responsibility whenever he 
could. When his brother-in-law, the Emperor Joseph 
the Second, visited Paris, he was astonished to find 
that Louis had never taken the trouble to visit the 
Hotel des Invalides (the great hospital for soldiers), 
nor the military schools of Paris. 

After Necker had retired, Louis tried several differ- 
ent ministers of finance, but could get none that saw 
any way out of the difficulties until M. de Calonne, 
a reckless, dashing man, deeply in debt and distinguish- 
ed equally for his elegant manners and his dissipated 



LOUIS XVI. 211 



life, found out the golden path. His plan was to 
spend money like water; that w^ould make every body 
rich. The courtiers got all they wanted, only for 
the asking; the idea of economy was ridiculed as an 
old-fashioned prejudice; every one who came in con- 
tact with the machinery of government was liberally 
paid, and tlie queen spent more than ever. AVe nat- 
urally ask where the money was found for all these 
purposes, when the tax-payers were already so bur- 
dened that another straw must break their backs. 
It was done by borrowing! Calonne seemed to think 
he had invented this operation, so proud was he of 
the success of his plan. In four years he had bor- 
rowed no less than eight hundred millions of francs, 
which there was no provision for paying. Meanwhile 
the distress of the people was becoming intolerable; 
angry murmurs arose on all sides, and as it was impos- 
sible for the goverment to pay even the interest on 
the loans made to it, the brilliant Calonne thought 
it was time to try something else. So he called to- 
gether the Assembly of the Notables. 

The notables were selected almost entirely from 
what were called the privileged classes — the nobles 
and the clergy. Calonne made them a speech in 
which he owned that he could not make the revenue 
of the country equal to expenses by a hundred rail- 
lions or so, but laid the blame upon Necker. Then 
he proposed a remedy more sensible than m.ight bave 
been expected from him, which was that the nobles 
and clergy should be taxed as well as the rest of the 
jDCople. La Fayette — our La Fayette — stood up boldly 
for this measure, though he was rich and would have 



278 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

had to pay large taxes; but he was almost the only 
one who did. The rest would not listen to it. Calonne 
was dismissed and another favorite of the queen's, 
named Brienne, put in his place, but he did no better. 
Just at this time somebody proposed a meeting of the 
States-General. 

The word acted like magic. How could they have 
forgotten that old guardian of the public interests, a 
representative assembly? They were very tired of 
being governed by kings and ministers; it had not 
worked well. Here was something that would set 
them all right again. The king consented, though 
rather reluctantly, and recalled Necker, who was 
quite willing to try once more to hold the helm of the 
unmanageable ship. Neither of them saw that it was 
drifting on towards a whirlpool which was to dash it 
to pieces! 

There were many difficulties in the way of calling 
together this assembly, which had not been summoned 
since Louis the Thirteenth came of age, in 1614. A 
hundred and seventy-five years! Great changes had 
taken place in that time. , Richelieu and Mazarin. had 
done their part in taking away from the people all 
energy for self-government; Louis the Fourteenth 
had made '* The king wills it" the only reason nec- 
essary for any act; Louis the Fifteenth had said to the 
Parliament of Paris, "You have heard my intentions; 
I desire that you will conform to thera. I order you 
to begin your duties. I forbid any discussions contrary 
to my wishes." 

The day for such sayings and doings was over. 
After all sorts of delays, the States-General opened on 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 279 

tlie fifth day of May, 1789. That clay marks the begin- 
ning' of the French Revolution; the greatest political 
and social earthquake the world has ever seen. 




CHAPTER XXIX. 

THE FiiEJS'CH kevolutio:n^. 1789. 

HE Assembly which now met at Versailles 
was comjDosed of representatives from three 
distinct classes — the nobles, the clergy and 
the Third Estate, which last corresponds to the English 
House of Commons. Each member of each class was 
elected by votes of citizens belonging to that class. 
On the day before the opening of the States there was 
a grand procession of all the members to the church 
of Notre Dame, to take part in a religious service 
there. The King was present with all his household 
— hundreds of lords and ladies, blazing with gold and 
jewels, and fanning the air with their lofty plumes as 
they rode along. The nobles who belonged to the 
States-General wore the fforo-eous costume of the time 
of Louis the Thirteenth: lon^: cloaks embroidered 
with gold, lace cravats, and "Henri Quatre " hats 
turned up at the side, with white plumes. The clergy 
were in the dress appropriate to their various ranks, 
from the purple velvet robe of the archbishop to the 
flowing. mantle and black cassock of the cwre, or parish, 
priest. The Tiers JEtat or Third Estate, — that is, the 
Commons, — were required to wear short black cloaks, 



280 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

white muslin cravats and a peculiar kind of slouched 
hat. No. wonder that they looked angrily from their 
own humble dress, purposely intended to make them 
look like servants in livery, to the magnificent array 
of their fellow-workers, and said one to another, "All 
this is bought with our money!" 

As soon as they had assembled and had listened to 
a gracious speech from the king, there began to be 
trouble. The Commons wished that all the Three 
Estates — the nobles, the clergy and themselves — 
should vote together; the other two insisted that all 
business should be done separately. For five weeks 
the Commons sat awaiting the surrender of the others, 
refusing even to look over the pile of letters and docu- 
ments which lay unopened upon their table, for fear 
of appearing to give up their principles; then, as the 
rest still held out, the representatives of the common 
people voted that they would proceed to business at 
once, with or without the other orders, under the name 
of the National Assembly. 

The king and court were astonished at such unheard- 
of boldness, and at once began to devise means for 
putting it down. Necker proposed to the king that 
he should hold a "royal sitting" in the Assembly; in 
other words, that he should go to them in person and 
tell them wliat he thought of their conduct. 

Under pretence that the Hall of Assembly could not 
be occupied while the preparations for the king's visit 
were jroino- on, the members were shut out when thev 
went as usual the next morning to take their seats. 
The president, who was the great astronomer Bailly, 
protested against this, and all the deputies went to a 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 281 

tennis-court near by, where tliey took a solemn oath 
that thev would continue to meet too-ether for the 
transaction of public business as long as the condition 
of the country required it. 

To prevent a second meeting of the Assembly, some 
of the nobles hit upon the brilliant plan of hiring; the 
room where they had met for a game of tennis on the 
next day. As if a body of men like that could be hin- 
dered in their plans by such childish tricks! The 
members immediately made arrangements to hold their 
session in a church. Here they were joined by a large 
proportion of the clergy, who were more in sympathy 
with them than with the court party, and the " royal 
sitting" was announced for the day following. 

There was no end to the foolish devices for mortify- 
ing and irritating the Assembly. Its members were 
ordered to enter by a side door, the principal one being 
reserved for the nobility, and when the President came 
to this door he found it locked. He knocked repeat- 
edly to have it opened, but was always told "it was 
not yet time." There was a pouring rain, and no shel- 
ter had been provided. The members of the Third 
Estate waited outside until thev were drenched through, 
and when they were at last admitted they found the 
nobles comfortably seated and the king ready to give 
them his commands. 

His majesty blamed them very much for their bad 
conduct, but graciously condescended to overlook it, 
and airreed to various chanjTcs which had been 
demanded. Too late! too late! It was poor Louis's fate 
to yield when he should have been firm, and be ob- 
stinate when he should have yielded. His concessions 



282 HISTORY OF FRANCE. . 

were of no use now; they ought to have been 
made earlier. And he knew the Commons no better 
than to finish off by ordering the whole assembly to 
adjourn, — that is, to break up their session for that 
day, — and re-assemble on the next in their different 
halls, each estate to transact business b}' itself. In 
case of a further refusal to do this, Louis hinted pretty 
plainly that he should dissolve them altogether. 

Blind king! had he forgotten Charles the First of 
England and his Parliament? Did he think that the 
Commons of France, after having had a hundred and 
fifty years to think the matter over in, were going to 
be any more easily managed than were the Commons 
of England? 

The king withdrew, followed by the nobles and the 
o-reater part of the clergy; the assembly kept their 
seats. In a short time the royal Master of Cere- 
monies came in and remarked, "Gentlemen, you have 
heard the orders of the king." "Yes," replied the 
President, "and I am now about to take the orders of the 
Assembly." The officer retired, not knowing what to 
do in such singular circumstances, and the Assem- 
bly, having been reminded by one of the members 
that " they were neither more nor less than they had 
been yesterday," proceeded to vote that any person 
who should interfere with their liberty should be pun- 
ished with death. 

It was not a wise thing for the queen and her friends 
to do to advise Louis to call together a body of troops 
for his defence, but these unfortunate people never did 
wise things. All their actions at this time seem to us, 
looking as we do at both sides of the question in the 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 283 

light of history, to be Very foolish. There were many 
desperate people in Paris at that time, for there was a 
terrible scarcity of food; and notliing was easier than 
to rouse them to fury and lead them on to wild deeds 
of bloodshed and revenge. 

The news that Necker, the people's favorite, had been 
dismissed, was the spark that set fire to the train. A 
furious mob collected in the gardens of the Palais Royal, 
where a young man named Oamille Desmoulins sprang 
upon a table and made a speech about Liberty that 
drove them more frantic than ever. Then seizing a 
green leaf from a tree he stuck it in his hat for a 
cockade; instantly the trees were stripped of their 
leaves, and a green sprig became the emblem of Lib- 
erty. 

After adorning themselves in this way, the rioters 
rushed through the streets yelling and shrieking as if 
they had been an enemy's soldiers sacking the city. 
They broke into every place where they thought there 
might be weapons concealed, seized all they could 
find, and forced the city authorities to order pikes to 
be made for them, that being the weapon most easily 
prepared. Fifty thousand pikes were made in two 
days. The soldiers of the regular army refused to fire 
upon the mob. Militia companies were organized 
under the name of the National Guard, and Paris was 
like a vast camp. The famous tri-color cockade of red, 
white and blue was adopted. Red and blue were the 
city colors, and white that of the Duke of Orleans, a 
worthless demagogue, Vvdio, being nearest of kin to the 
royal family, hoped to be made king if Louis should 
be dethroned. He was great-grandson of the Regent 



284 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

who misgoverned France during the infancy of Louis 
the Fifteenth. 

In the midst of this fierce excitement, a report was 
spread about that the king meant to break up the 
Assembly by force, and that the cannon of the Bastille 
would be pointed against the city if there should be 
any resistance. A terrible cry rang through the streets, 
"To the Bastille! To the Bastille!" and soon the 
surging, roaring crowd, was on its way there. 

This old fortress had been built for the protection 
of the city from foreign enemies, and ever since the 
time of Richelieu had been used as a prison for offend- 
ers against the government. All the associations 
of the cruel " lettres de cachet" clustered about it; 
the very word brought to mind the odious tyranny 
which had buried alive, as it were, so many good and 
true souls. It represented to the unthinking mob 
every abuse that their country had been groaning 
under since the happy days of Henry the Fourth; no 
wonder that their first longing, on finding themselves 
in power, was to destroy it. 

No words can paint the fearful scene that followed. 
The Bastille was bravely defended by its governor, 
the Marquis de Launay, and his little guard of soldiers, 
but after a siege of several hours the insurgents forced 
their way in, murdered the brave governor and three 
of his officers, and did not pause in its wild fury until 
the ancient stronghold was a heap of smoking ruins. 
Only seven prisoners were found there, some of whom 
were serving out sentences for forgery, of which they 
had been convicted by the courts, and the rest, relics 
of a former generation, having lost their memory or 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 



reason, were detained only because the officers did not 
know what else to do with thein. The key of the 
Bastille was sent by La Fayette to Washington, and 
was kept by him as a sacred relic at Mount. Yernon, 
where it remains and is exhibited to this day. 

While the seven prisoners were carried through the 
streets on men's shoulders in triumph, the work of 
destruction was o-oinsr on behind them. As the old 
stones were hurled from their places, records were 
brought to light which inflamed the passions of the 
assailants more and more. In one cell was found a 
letter, dated thirty-seven years before. Here is a part 
of it. " If for my consolation Monseigneur would 
grant me, for the sake of God and the most blessed 
Trinity, that I could have news of my dear wife, were 
it only her name on a card, to show that she is alive ! 
I shall forever bless the greatness of Monseigneur." 
Who knows how many years of heart-breaking had 
gone before the writing of this letter which was never 
sent? Or how many years more were endured by the 
poor wretch before his turn came to be carried out of 
his cell and laid in an unknown grave? 

But we must not linger over such memorials. We 
must go back to the lawless rabble that all day and all 
nisrht rushed howlins* from one end of Paris to the other. 
The heads of the officers who fell at their posts were cut 
off and carried on pikes through the streets, amidst the 
curses of the populace. . A 3'oung girl, supposed to be 
the daughter of De Launay, narrowly escaped being 
burned alive in the Bastille yard, and was only rescued 
by a soldier of the National Guard, who carried her 
off to a place of safety. Still the great stones of the 



286 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

fortress are wrenched from their places, and hurled 
headlong into the ditch, one after another; while far 
away in the Hotel de Ville, forty-eight thousand 
pounds of powder are given out to the mob by the 
tremblino- officials. 

To the king and court, meanwhile, assembled at 
Versailles, all these things came as disturbing rumors, 
not quite enough to excite any great alarm, perhaps, 
but disao-reeable. There has been feastino- and danc- 
ing going on, as usual, in the beautiful orange-gar- 
den, and the gay lords and ladies have had their 
jokes and shrugged their shoulders at the vulgar 
doings of the canaille., (the French name for the 
common people). Louis has retired for the night, 
when the Duke de Liancourt, a gentleman of his 
household, comes to him to say that the Bastille is 
taken by the Paris mob. " Why, that's a revolt!" 
says the king, a puzzled look coming over his heavy, 
good-natured face. " No, Sire," answers the clearer- 
headed nobleman; "it is a revolution!" 

The National Assembly had now been sitting for 
more than a month. At Louis's request the nobles had 
joined it, but with a few exceptions it was only in out- 
ward form; tfieir hearts were as far from the Commons 
as ever. Still the pure-minded La Fayette was there, 
now as ever on the side of liberty, but also on that of 
law and order; and here and there a man of rank was 
found large-minded enough to follow his example. 
The leading spirit of the Assembly was Count. 
Mirabeau, who, rejected from serving with his 
own order by the votes of his equals, threw him- 
self fiercely into the popular party, and poured 



THE F BENCH REVOLUTION. 287 

out a torrent of fiery eloquence against the abuses of 
po\ver. 

The day after the storming of the Bastille, a deputa- 
tion was about to set out from the x\ssembly to have 
one more conference with the king, (there had been 
many such already), to protest against the presence of 
foreign soldiers and to demand certain reforms. Just 
before they started the members were told that the 
king was coming to them, without even a guard. He 
entered the Assembly room accompanied only by his 
two brothers, and was received with shouts of applause. 
He promised all that they wanted; he would send 
away the soldiers; he would recall Necker; if they 
would only have confidence in him they need fear 
nothinor. 

The applause grew wilder than ever; when the king 
went home the Assembly accompanied him in a 
body, as his escort; he could scarcely make his way 
through the crowd that pressed about him, eager to 
show their love and confidence. Happy Louis! On 
the palace balcony stood the beautiful Marie Antoinette 
with her two children at her side. The eldest, a 
graceful young girl, was playing with her little broth- 
er's lonoj' curls, and her eves filled with tears as she 
saw her father approaching, as it were, in the arms of 
his loving subjects. It was a beautiful scene of afi'ec- 
tion and trust, but it was the last. 

Alas! the old distrust soon broke out again. The 
Count d'Artois, (Louis's youngest brother), and sev- 
eral of the highest nobility, with their families, took 
the imprudent step of leaving France secretly, some 
of them in disguise, thus showing that they were in 



288 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

fear for their lives, and making the feelings of the 
people more bitter against them than ever. 

Louis at least was not afraid. He went to Paris, in 
spite of the tears and entreaties of the queen, that he 
might show himself to his people. At the city gates 
he was met by Bailly, who had just been made Mayor, 
and who handed him the keys, saying: "These are 
the same that were, given up to King Henry the 
Fourth, of glorious memory. Then, it was a king who 
had conquered the people; now, it is a people who are 
conquering their king! " 

At first the populace received the king in grim 
silence; but after a few kindly words at the Hotel de 
Ville, (City Hall), their hearts melted and they broke 
into loud hurrahs. But the calm was only for a mo- 
ment. To gratify them he put on the tricolored cock- 
ade, and gave his consent to La Fayette's being ap- 
pointed commander of the National Guard, (though it 
made no difference whether he consented or not); then, 
all being serene, he went back to his quiet palace at 
Versailles. 

The raging crowd, however, must have a victim. It 
did not take lono; to find one. Amono- the ministers 
who had succeeded Necker was Foulon, well-known as 
an oppressor of the poor. When they complained of 
starvation and asked for help, he said, " Let them eat 
grass; there's plenty of that ! " And now they remem- 
bered it. Li spite of his white hair and his sevent}^- 
four years, he was dragged out from his hiding-place, 
and with a bunch of hay tied to his back, and a collar 
of thistles round his throat, he was hanged to a lamp- 
post. Then his head was cut off and carried about on 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 289 

a j^ike, the mouth stuifed full of grass. " Let him eat 
it himself!'' shrieked the crowJ. His son-in-law, 
Borthier, saw the gory head without suspecting whose 
it was. His own turn was coming. As he was forced 
through the streets, huge placards were carried with 
him with such inscriptions as this: " He robbed the 
king and France!" "He devoured the substance of 
the people!" "He was the slave of the rich and the 
tyrant of the poor!" "He drank the blood of the 
widow and orphan!" Terrible accusations! Like 
Foulon, he paid the penalty of his crimes by a wretched 
death, and another head at the end of a pike made its 
rounds amid the hootings of the populace. From this 
time the terrible cry "a id lanternel '''' — "To the 
lamp-post with him! " — became one of the too-familiar 
sounds of Paris. 

While such things are going on in Paris, dreadful 
news comes from the provinces. The people have 
risen; castles and convents are burning; delicate 
ladies and their daughters are driven from their homes 
with outrage; nobles are hacked in pieces before the 
eyes of their wives and children; tax-gatherers are 
roasted over a slow fire! Title deeds, dating back hun- 
dreds of years, are destroyed like waste paper; and — 
can such things be? — the peasants have even dared to 
kill the game! The sacred deer and pheasants, to 
prc.'serve which their poor little farms have become 
almost a wilderness — these they are destroying for 
food, with no fear of God or man before their eyes! 
Clearly, it is time to do something. 

The nobles in the National Assembly, who have up to 
this time stood apart from the Commons in disdainful 
19 



290 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

silence, declinino- to vote. thoii<xh forced to sit in the 
same room, now press forward eagerly to give up their 
privileges, according to a plan drawn up by the victo- 
rious Necker, now for the third time at the head of the 
king's council. They cannot do enough. Now they 
have begun, they are afraid to stop. All taxation is 
to be in proportion to the wealth of the citizen; no or- 
der shall be free from it; no more serfs, no corvde, no 
more game-preserves. Equal rights everywhere. The 
clergy were as forward as the nobles in giving' up their 
time-honored privileges. In a short time it was voted 
that the whole system of tithes should be abolished , 
and that the clergy should depend only on some in- 
definite promises of the new government to provide 
for them. The laws were' passed, the king gave his 
consent to them, and once more it seemed as if pru- 
dence and good sense might yet save the ship of state 
from the whirlpool on the brink of which it was sail- 
ing- 




CHAPTER XXX. 

THE EEVOLUTION, CONTINUED. 1789-1790. 

DDITIONAL reo'iments of soldiers were now 
ordered to .Versailles to protect the king. 
The officers alreadv stationed there 2:ave their 



newly-arrived brethren a banquet in the palace- 
theatre, which was graciously lent them by the king 
for the purpose. Very naturally, their gratitude led 



X 

J 



THE REVOLUTION— CONTINUED. 291 

them into the most enthusiastic praise of so amial)lc a 
sovereign; they drank his health amidst deafening ap- 
plause; fair hands distributed the white cockade of 
the Bourbons, and to crown all, the queen herself did 
the guests the honor to come into the room, holding 
the little Dauphin by the hand. Then some strange 
madness seized the revellers. The tricolor was torn 
off and trampled under foot; "The Nation," that new- 
born power which was already so terrible, though they 
knew it not, was treated with contempt. In their mis- 
taken loyalty, they had only added another to the 
many daggers aimed at* the heart of their unhappy 
king. 

When the news of this banquet reached the starv- 
ing wretches in Paris, the old fury, which had been 
lulled a little by the king's pacific visit, broke out 
again. "What!" they said, "shall we eat our black 
broad mingled with clay, and too little of it at that, 
while kings and queens and idle soldiers riot in abund- 
ance? The cost of one such dinner would have "iven 
half Paris a meal. Down with Aristocrats! " 

The long lines of pale, hungry people waiting at 
the doors of bakers' shops for their turn to buy a little 
bad bread at famine price — standing en queue^ as the 
French call it, that is, one behind another — ^^these 
caught up the cry, and shouted it to Heaven. And 
when the hollow-eyed mothers, gaunt with want and 
misery, shared the poor morsel among their hungry 
children, and saw their longing eyes beg for more — 
what wonder that they too should take up the cry, 
" Down with Tyranny! Death to Aristocrats! Hur- 
rah for Liberty! '* . 



292 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Now beoran a hideous scene. These same women 
and others like them, forgettuigin theh' fury that they 
were women, rushed through the streets like an ava- 
lanche, increasing in numbers as they advanced, shriek- 
aig, cursing, beathig drums, hustling away all who 
tried to stop them — thus did this frantic female mob 
force its way through the streets to the Hotel de Ville. 
They seized any weapon that came to hand, pokers, 
fire-irons, axes, clubs, rusty old muskets and pistols; 
and thus armed, howling like demons, demanded that 
the Commune should ffive them bread. 

The Commune, thus addressed, was a city govern- 
ment established by the National party after the 
opening of the Assembly at Versailles. Not being able 
to find the ma3''or or other officers the furies set fire to 
the building a fine old edifice, dating back to the time 
of Henry the Fourth. Fortunately, the fire was put 
out, but nothing would now satisfy the enraged mul- 
titude except marching to Versailles. Louis received 
them kindly, as he did everybody, and for the moment 
they were softened, and cried out: "Long live the 
King! " But quarrels had broken out between them 
and the soldiers in the palace, and two of the king's 
body-guard (who were all selected from the nobility) 
were killed. The mob was constantly increased by 
fresh arrivals from Paris, and rusty old cannon were 
dragged along by cart-horses, seized with or without 
leave wherever they could be found. 

At midnight La Fayette arrived with a part of the 
National Guard. The magic of his presence calmed 
down the excitement, and Versailles sank into some- 
thing like repose. He promised the king that his 



THE REVOLUTION— CONTINUED. 293 

troops should keep order, and the royal family, worn 
out by the terrors of the day, retired to rest. Towards 
morning a band of ruffians broke into the palace by a 
gate left unguarded, and with horrible threats and 
cries rushed through the marble corridors that led to 
the queen's apartment. The sentries are trodden 
down, run through with a score of pikes; the body- 
guard fly through the halls, shouting, "Save the 
queen ! " The mging mob penetrate at last to the 
queen's apartments. They do not find her there; she 
has taken refuo^e in those of the kino;- In their wild 
spite they run her bed through and through with their 
bayonets. 

La Fayette called in his soldiers and the palace was 
cleared of the mob. One can not but smile with a 
sort of sad amusement at reading that as he was flying 
through the halls towards the private rooms of the 
king with the hope of saving him, a Master of Cere- 
monies called out to him, " Monsieur, the king permits 
you to enter his presence !" Even at a moment like 
that, the courtier could not forget his etiquette. 

Outside the palace, the sea of human beings surges 
backwards and forwards like a roarins; flame. All the 
scum of Paris has come to Versailles. Robbery goes 
hand in hand with riot. No one* can sleep in the 
midst of the frightful din; those who have anything 
to lose must watch it; those who have not must seize 
what they can. The king^s own body-guard has 
mounted the tricolor; they show themselves on the 
balconies, waving their hats, with immense cockades 
stuck in them, which the women in the palace have 
been busy for the last hour in making. 



294 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

As the daylig-lit advances there are loud shouts for 
"the queen! the queen!" She steps out upon the 
balcony, holding in one hand the princess, in the 
other Louis the Dauphin. " No children ! We want 
no children !" shriek the crowd. The mother gently 
pushes her children back into the room and stands 
alone in full view of the stormy multitude, her hands 
crossed on her breast. " I am ready to die," she says. 
True daughter of Maria Theresa! 

A man levels his musket at heri it is struck down 
by a companion. Once more La Fayette comes to the 
rescue. He kneels and kisses the queen's wdiite hand. 
Then the rabble shout " Long live the queen !" so 
easily can their fickle minds be changed. But now a 
new cry arises and is caught up from mouth to mouth: 
"The king to Paris!" They want to have him where 
they can get at him ; he must be in their power. There 
are rumors of an intention to escape. He must not 
get away. 

The king has no choice; he must go. La Fayette 
tells the people it shall be so. Such a shout rends the 
air as can almost be heard at Paris, twelve miles away. 
The morning passes in anxious preparations. The 
queen looks sadly on the splendors she is leaving; 
well for her that she does know she is never to see them 
again. At two o'clock in the day the mournful pro- 
cession sets out. In the great state-carriage are the 
king, his sister Elizabeth, his wife and the two children. 

Outside — it is hard to give you a picture of the out- 
side. A hundred deputies followed the king in car- 
riages, and so far the procession had some dignity; but 
in front, at the sides, behind, pressed a ferocious mass 



THE RE VOL UTION— CONTINUED. 295 

of Immanity, giving' vent to their brutal passions in 
hovvlino;, dancino* and shoutino- out sonofs whose evil 
words were meant to be applied to the royal family. 
Fishwomen, (the lowest and most degraded class in 
Paris), sat astride on cannons; carts loaded with flour 
were escorted by ]:)oth men and women carrying green 
boLio'hs, amidst which the 2;litterinor ends of lances 
shone out; loaves of bread were paraded on the ends 
of bayonets. The soldiers of his Majesty's body- 
guard straggled along after his carriage, all disarmed, 
mauv without their hats, all faint with fati":ue. Some 
one had taken the bloody heads of the guardsmen 
killed the day before to a barber in Sevres, and forced 
him to curl and powder the hair, that they might be 
known for aristocrats. These were borne aloft on 
lances until La Fayette saw them and compelled the 
savages who were carrying them to give up their 
horrible trophies. 

The fishwomen (poissardes) shouted to those they 
met, " Oouraffe, friends! We shall have bread enouofh 
now, for here we have the baker and his wife, and 
their little boy! " This was an allusion to the days of 
a previous famine, when the king was called a baker 
because it was said he could provide bread for the 
people if he would. There was a drizzling rain, while 
for eight miserable hours the dreary procession slowly 
wound its way through the throng. At last, wear3'-and 
sick at heart, they reached the palace of the Tuileries. 
This journey was called, with a sort of unintentional 
mockery, " The Joyous Entry." 

At the Tuileries they spent a very quiet year. 
Louis's greatest trial was that he could not hunt; he 



296 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

does not seem to have concerned himself much about 
the doings of the Assembly, and they on their part 
paid small attention to him. 

The six-years-old Dauphin was perhaps the happiest 
of the family. He had a little garden of his own, 
fenced in by itself, in which the people could see him 
from the street digging away with all his might, and 
watching for his radishes and lettuces to come peep- 
ing up from the ground with as much pleasure as if he 
had not been a prince. His sister, Maria Theresa 
(who was called Madame Itoyale^ though she was but 
a little girl), was not so light-hearted. She was old 
enough to sympathize with her mother's troubles; and 
though always gentle and lovely, she grew up under a 
shadow of sadness that was never cleared away. The 
king's sister, the excellent Madame Elizabeth, was also 
with them; his brothers and their families had taken 
refuo;e in other countries. 

The nobility now emigrated in great numbers, no 
one caring at this time to prevent their quitting the 
kingdom provided they left their houses and lands 
behind them. In the meantime all titles were abol- 
ished; the proudest duke, if he remained in France, 
must be content to be called simply " citizen;" the 
rio-ht of the eldest son to inherit the landed estate was 
taken away, and parents were compelled to divide their 
property equally among all their children. In addi- 
tion to these remarkable changes, almost every man 
in the country was allowed to vote. 

Necker, who w^as once more minister of finance, 
had o;reat trouble to " make both ends meet," for 
previous waste had made the country very poor, 



THE REVOLUTION— CONTINUED. 297 

though it was now governed economically enough. 
In this difficulty the celebrated Talleyrand, himself a 
bishop, proposed that all the property of the clergy 
should be confiscated. Their tithes, that is, the taxes 
collected especially for them, had already been taken 
awa}'', but they had an enormous amount of real estate 
or houses and land, besides other possessions. The 
Church is said to have owned in France a terri- 
tory larger than all England. These lands the 
government took for its own use, and as nobody 
wanted to buy all this oroperty, a kind of paper-money 
called assignats was made, which was to represent it 
and be redeemed gradually by the sale of the property. 

The state paid its debts with this currency, and for 
a little while it answered as well as real money; but 
during the troubled times that followed, the property 
could be sold only for a very small part of its origi- 
inal value, while the government went on issuing 
assignats for far more than that original value. The 
less they were good for, the more of them were made 
by these singular financiers; and the result was of 
course that they became in the end utterly worthless. 
The same thing happened to the "Continental Cur- 
rency" after our own Revolution. 

With a view of joining all parties in a state of gen- 
eral good feeling, a theatrical display was got up 
by the authorities iu the year 1790, to celebrate the 
first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille. It 
was called the " Fete of the Federation," and was held 
in the great open square called the "Champ de Mars," 
(Field of Mars), which is still used in Paris for military 
parades. The earth was dug out from one part and 



298 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

piled up in others so as to form vast amphitheatres, 
which were terraced into seats capable of holding sever- 
al hundred thousand people. 

Every body helped in this work. Abbes, dukes, 
members of Assembly, stood shoulder to shoulder with 
shop-keepers and mechanics; even ladies took part, 
inspired by the general enthusiasm. In the midst of 
the field an altar was set up; mass was said by the 
Bishop of Autun, (Talleyrand), and afterward the 
oath to support the new constitution was taken by La 
Fayette and the great mass of " federates." Then the 
king repeated the oath aloud; banners were waved, 
sabres flashed in the air, and the whole vast crowd 
cried — " I swear it! " The queen, who was placed on 
a balcony near by, held up the Dauphin in her arms, 
as if he joined his father in the solemn promise. At 
this sight, shouts of the wildest joy broke from the as- 
semblage. There was a delirium of gladness. If 
throats were not split, it was because throats are very 
strong. The golden age seemed to have come at last. 

The festival lasted for several days, and was held in 
various places. Over the gate of the old place of the 
Bastille was a sign, " Dancing here." The great 
square was lighted with colored lamps, and in the 
midst was a pole sixty feet high, with a huge liberty- 
cap on the top. At one side was a dark pile of ruins 
lighted by a single lamp. If you went near enough 
yoM could see a confused mass of broken stones, and 
the corner of an iron cage; not much, but enough to 
show the change that one short year had brought about. 
The Bastille and Liberty ! Who could have guessed 
that these names would ever be associated together ? 



FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 299 

After all this joyousness, what remained ? All the 
old doubt and hatred, as strong as ever. A French 
historian calls it " a fete that had no morrow." Riots 
continued to take place in the provinces; Necker, 
hitherto the people's idol, found himself growing- 
unpopular, and gave up his place for the last time. 
The great republican, Mirabeau, who was trusted by 
both king and nation, and whose influence might have 
prevented tlie horrors which came afterward, died a 
few months after the fete, and there was no one left to 
advise the king wisely, or moderate the madness of the 
people. 



CHAPTER XX XL 

FROM THE FLIGHT OF THE KING TO HIS DEATH.- 

1791-1793. 




CTING on the bad advice of his friends, 
Louis now took a step which forever killed 
the chance of reconciliation between himself 
and the nation, if indeed there ever had been any 
chance — he attempted to fly from the kingdom. 

At first sight it seems as if this was just the thing 
that would have suited everybody, as it would have 
left those who disliked his government to form such a 
one as pleased them. But leaving his country meant 
also collecting an army abroad, which, together with 
the thousands of emigrants already beyond the bor- 
ders, would invade France to establish his power again 
by force of arms. 



300 mSTOMY OF FRANCE. 

* 
He bad already been negotiating secretly with various 
foreign princes, who were to furnish hira with men and 
money, and by the efforts of faithful friends all arrange- 
ments were made for the flight of the royal party. But 
none of these people had any practical knowledge of 
life, and the whole expedition was nothing but a series 
of blunders. As much time was spent in preparing for 
the journey as if a pleasure party had been in view, 
and meanwhile the precious hours were slipping away. 
When at last all was ready, and the queen set out to 
meet her husband, who had preceded her, neither she 
nor the soldier who was to be her guide knew the way 
about Paris, and they wandered through the streets for 
an hour trying to find the carriage in which the king, 
nearly distracted, was waiting for them. And what a 
carriage! Instead of a commonplace vehicle which 
might have passed without notice, they had a large 
lumbering new coach, painted in bright colors, which 
could not fail to attract the attention of all passers-by. 
Count Fersen, a young Swedish officer, acted as coach- 
man. Inside (when they all got together at last) were 
the governess, who was called the Baroness de Korff, 
and was to pass for a mother traveling with her chil- 
dren; the king dressed as a valet, the queen as a 
lady's maid, the Dauphin, the Princess Royal, and 
the king's sister, Madame Elizabeth, who was to repre- 
sent the Baroness's traveling companion. 

The great, shining coach, with couriers in yellow 
livery riding in front of it, and a smaller carriage be- 
hind to carry extras, had to stop several times for 
repairs, and actually traveled sixty-nine miles in 
twenty-two hours, when the inmates were flying for 



. FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 301 

their lives! During all this time it was a mark for 
every eye, and spies were sent to follow it. In spite 
of all their imprudence the party arrived safely at the 
village of St. Men^hould, where the king repeated the 
folly he had often committed during the journey, and 
put his head out of the coach window to see what was 
detaining them. He was recognized by a young man 
named Drouet, a violent republican, who instantly 
jumped upon his horse and rode as fast as possible 
across the country to Yarennes, which was the next 
station, warning the authorities there to be on the 
look-out for the king. 

To his deep mortification, Louis was stopped here 
and forced to turn back, and a wretched journey 
which lasted durino^ the whole weekbrouirht them airain 
to Paris. Two deputies from the National Assembly 
rode back in the carriage with them, and they were 
constantly subjected to affronts which made their 
situation all the more painful. The king was now 
more strictly guarded than ever. Soldiers were sta- 
tioned at the doors of the royal apartments, and it 
was with diffioulty that the queen obtained leave to 
have the doors shut while dressing and undressing. 

The Assembly, after a stormy debate, passed a 
decree excusino- the kins: for his fliorht, but warninjx 
him that if he should repeat the attempt he would be 
dealt with as an enemy. It then declared its exist- 
ence at an end, and a new election was held through- 
out France, at which none of the old members were 
allowed to be candidates. A new body of men, who 
called themselves the Legislative Assembly, were 
elected, and were in every way inferior to the old, 



302 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

many of them being ignorant, coarse persons, of very 
little ability. They were soon divided into parties 
which struggled furiously for the mastery, one being for 
a constitutional monarchy, another for a republic, and 
still another desiring nothing so much as a gen- 
eral sweeping away of everything that had gone before 
them, and a reign of disorder and confusion. 

The friends of monarchy outside of France were 
not idle. Armies were raised in Germany for the 
support of the king, to which the Assembly responded 
by declaring war against the Empire. Some fighting 
was done which was not favorable to France, and 
thinking that treachery on the part of the king and his 
friends must have brouo-ht about this result, a violent 
tumult took j)lace at Paris. ' A great rabble assembled, 
armed with clubs, scythes, axes, and the unfailing 
pike, and carrying hideous emblems and mottoes, and 
rushed through the Hall of Assembly with a mad 
uproar. A calf's heart on the end of a pike was 
labelled " Heart of an aristocrat ! " A pair of ragged 
breeches, borne aloft in the same way, bore the inscrijj- 
, tion: " The Sans-Culottes* are coming ! " " Death to 
Tyrants ! " " Liberty or Death ! " and other threaten- 
ing expressions blazed on their hastily-made banners. 
The mob next went to the Tuileries palace and forced 
its way up the grand staircase into the presence of the 
king, hurling out insults and threats as it passed 
along. One of the rioters, handed the red cap (the 

* " Sans-Culottes " was the name given to the most squalid 
and degraded class of the Parisians. It means literally " with- 
out breeches." 



FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 303 

emblem of revolution, or, as they called it, of liberty), 
on the point of a pike, to the king. He put it on at 
once, and the queen appeared with an enormous tri- 
colored cockade in her hair. The crowd swarmed on 
through the noble halls of the old palace, scream- 
ing out their howls for liberty and curses on tyrants. 
After some hours of this horrible rioting the mayor 
made his tardy appearance, and with honied words 
persuaded the mob to disperse. 

The noble courage which the royal family had dis- 
played during this trying scene was turning the tide 
of popular feeling in their favor, when, unfortunately, 
just at this time the Duke of Brunswick, who was in 
command of the armies allied against France, issued 
an insolent and irritating proclamation in which he 
commanded the French nation instantly to return to 
their allegiance, threatening to sack the city of Paris 
if the smallest injury were done to the king or his 
family. This ill-judged action was like a spark ap- 
plied to gunpowder; the violent party, who were 
called Jacobins, were beside themselves with rage, and 
demanded from the Assembly the instant trial and 
deposition of the king. 

The more moderate members having voted down 
this proposition, the Jacobins, led by the fierce Dan- 
ton, determined to carry out their wishes by force. 
On the tenth of August, 1792, a desperate mob 
thronged the streets leading to the palace of the 
Tuileries. This they surrounded, bringing cannon to 
bear upon it from all directions, and a large propor- 
tion of the National Guard placed there for the dcr- 
fence of the palace having joined the roiters, Louis 



304 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



thoughtit necessary to give up any attempt at resistance. 
His faithful Swiss Guards were with him, ready to lay 
down their lives in defending hira, and several hun- 
dred gentlemen who had formed part of his court in 
happier days crowded about him, eager to be of 
service, but their good wishes could avail little in the 
face of the infuriated mob. In the midst of the ex- 
citement, a message was brought from the Assembl}^ 
offering to take the royal family under its protection. 
" I would rather be nailed to the palace walls than 
leave them! " exclaimed the indignant queen; but her 
husband dreaded the sacrifice of life that must follow 
if they stayed, and decided to accept the invitation. 
With great difficulty he and his family forced their 
way through the crowd, attended by his friends, and 
leaving the Swiss Guard on duty at the palace. The 
king entered the Hall of Assembly with great dignity. 
"Gentlemen," said he, " I have come to prevent the 
commission of a great crime." The royal party were 
placed in the reporter's box behind the president's 
chair, a closet six feet square and eight feet high, into 
which the burning rays of an August sun poured their 
splendor. For fourteen hours they were packed in 
this miserable place, listening to the wild har- 
angues of the Jacobin orators, and the furious out- 
cries which resounded through the streets. They 
were scarcely seated when the sound of cannon from 
the Tuilcries showed that the fight had begun. Louis, 
always anxious to stop the shedding of blood, sent 
word to the Swiss Guards to cease firing; by some 
mistake the order was not given to the whole regiment, 
and while a part of them marched out, some three 



FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 305 

hundred remained at their posts in the palace and 
were cut to pieces by the mob. Not one escaped. The 
Tuileries was sacked and plundered by the frenzied 
rabble, who murdered every human being found within 
its limits. The gentlemen-ushers, the valets, the 
pages, the door-keepers, the very cooks and scullions, 
were hacked to pieces and their bodies stripped and 
mutilated. Streams of blood ran through the palace; 
women mingled with men in the indiscriminate massa- 
cre, and cut strips of flesh from the dead bodies, 
which they held up with yells of triumph; one could 
not go from room to room except by treading on the 
slain. Every corner of the palace was ransacked, 
bureaux and desks were broken open, the contents of 
the cellars turned out, furniture and works of art hurled 
from the windows or chopped to pieces inside; and 
finally the mad, drunken wretches began to fall upon 
one another, not knowing what they did, and their 
corpses were mingled with those of the defenders of 
the palace, in one vast heap of dead. 

After two or three days of suspense the king and 
his family were sent to a gloomy fortress called the 
Temple, which had been taken from the old Knights 
Templars by Philip the Fair. Here it would seem 
as if the malice of their enemies might at least have 
allowed them the ordinary comforts of life, as they 
were strongly guarded and could do no harm, but 
they were treated with the utmost severity. The sol- 
diers who guarded them took pleasure in insulting 
them, and they could not stir out of their rooms with- 
out being exposed to brutal affronts. They accepted 
their situation with great dignity and courage, and the 
20 



306 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

queen, as long as she was allowed to do so, went on 
rognlavly with her children's education. 

Meanwhile the government was busily emj)loyed in 
driving out of France the allied armies who presumed 
to invade her soil. The latter at first had some suc- 
cesses, which terrified the revolutionists, and they re- 
solved upon a horrible plan by which to get rid of 
those at home who were unfavorable to them. All 
])ersons suspected of being royalists were arrested 
and placed in confinement, until every prison in Paris 
was crowded with them; then ruffians were hired by 
the Commune to murder them all. In order that as 
many citizens as possible might enjoy the spectacle, 
seats were placed in the prison yards, some labelled 
" for gentlemen," others " for ladies." Then the work 
of death beo-an. A mock-court was held within the 
walls; each prisoner was called up in turn and sen- 
tenced after a short examination, witli^or without 
proof; then they were thrust through a small gate 
into the courtyard, where they were instantly hacked 
to pieces by the assassins. 

For four da3^s this hideous work went on, until the 
prisons were emptied and there were no more victims 
to be put to death. The beautiful Princess de Lamballe, 
the most intimate friend of Marie Antoinette, was 
murdered with savage cruelty, and her bleeding head 
liold up on a pike before the queen's window in the 
Temple. Such horrible crimes were committed as the 
j)en refuses to record; it was a carnival of blood and 
outrage. Among the first victims were a great com- 
pany of priests, who were peculiarly the objects of 
public hatred. The venerable archbishop of Aries 



FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 307 

was killed on the steps of the altar. The stories of 
what occurred during those days of horror fill vol- 
umes, and yet but a small part has been written down. 
One young lady, when her father was sentenced to 
death, threw herself passionately between him and the 
assassins, bogging for his life. One of them filled a 
cup with freshly flowing blood, exclaiming: " This is 
the blood of an aristocrat. Drink it, and we will let 
him go." Without a moment's hesitation she drained 
the cup, and the applauding crowd permitted her and 
her father to pass out in safety. The butchers were 
sustained at their work by frequent draughts of wine, 
and at its close received the thanks of their employers. 

The operations of the army were extremely credit- 
able. The republican general, Dumouriez, gained the 
victories of Valmy and Jemappes, and raised the 
spirits of the Assembly so mucli that they published a 
vaino'lorious letter ofFerino: their assistance to all na- 
tions wlio mijrht wish to free themselves from the 
tyranny of their rulers; and growing bolder as they 
went on, they soon proclaimed that wherever the 
French armies went, monarchy should be at an end, 
old distinctions abolished and the property of nobles 
and priests confiscated. Their insolence kept pace 
with their success. 

In one of the previous battles. La Fayette, who re- 
mained faithful to that part of the Assembly still ac- 
knowledging the king, was on that account deserted 
by his troops and went over to the Austrian camp for 
safety. Instead of receiving him hospitably, as a 
person who had done every thing he could for the 
royal family in whose cause they were fighting, the 



308 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

Austrians kept him as a prisoner, and for five years he 
was confined in a loathsome dungeon. He was not 
released until after the peace of Campo Formio, in 1798. 

The next change in the varying government of 
France was the assembling of a National Convention, 
of which a large proportion of the members were 
committed beforehand to the destruction of the king. 
On the first day of their meeting they voted that royalty 
was abolished, and that any emigrants who should return 
to France or be taken in battle should be put to death. 
All titles of nobility were suppressed, and even the 
ordinary forms of courtesy were to be done away with. 
It was forbidden to say Monsieur or Madame, and 
every one, high or low, must be addressed as " Citi- 
zen." 

Two opposite parties existed in the Convention, 
one consisting of the moderate members, called Giron- 
dists, and the other composed of the Jacobins and 
other turbulent and bloodthirsty persons who took the 
name of Mountaineers, from the places they occupied 
in the Assembly-hall. These last were representatives 
of the worst class of the community, and being led by 
Danton, Marat and Robespierre, men of ability with- 
out conscience, soon awed the Girondists into submis- 
sion. The king, or, as the accusation called him, Louis 
Capet, was brought to trial before the Convention. 
" Sit down, Louis," said the president, Barrere, " and 
answer the questions that shall be put to you." He 
was accused of misgo vernment and of secret correspond- 
ence with the enemies of France. He replied with 
great moderation, calmness and good sense; but his 
cause was judged beforehand, and after a violent 



FLIGHT AND DEATH OF THE KING. 309 

discussion which lasted three days, he was declared 
guilty and sentenced to death. 

This was not done without a desperate struggle. 
Even after the death-sentence was passed there were 
many who voted for delay, but the tiger-element 
carried the day, and Louis was told that in twenty-four 
hours he' must die. Even his own blood-relation, the 
Duke of Orleans — no Duke now, but "Philippe Egalite," 
(Equality — that being the new name he had adopted), 
voted for death without delay. A miserable wretch, 
this, who hoped to rise to power over his kinsman's 
grave; to be disappointed, we shall be glad to learn, 
when his turn comes. 

The execution took place on the 21st of January, 
1793. Louis, who had been for some time separated 
from his family, was now allowed to take leave of 
them. After this melancholy farewell the king slept 
soundly. In the morning his confessor came to him ; 
he received the sacrament, and remained at his devo- 
tions until he was told, " the hour is come." He was 
taken in a carria2:e throufrh the silent streets, where 
one universal feeling of awe pervaded all hearts. 
Shops were shut, windows down, all business sus- 
pended. No voice dared to utter a word of sympathy, 
but a heavy shadow rested upon the city. When he 
arrived at the place where the guillotine stood waiting 
for him, the drums began to beat. "Silence!" he 
exclaimed angrily, turning towards them. They 
stopped, and he advanced to the edge of the scaffold, 
and, addressing the vast crowd assembled there, said, 
"Frenchmen, I die innocent. I pardon my enemies, 
and I pray that France " Here the brutal official 



310 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

who had charge of the execution, ordered the drums to 
beat, and the rest of the speech was not heard. When 
the officers bes^an to bind his arras he resisted, wishins: 
to be spared that last indignity ; his confessor, who 
had remained with him, reminded him that in submit- 
ting to this he was only suffering as our Saviour had 
done, and he yielded. "Son of St. Louis, ascend to 
heaven!" said the abb6; the axe fell; the head rolled 
in the dust. The executioner picked it up by the hair 
and held it up before the people, who answered by 
shouts of " Long live the Republic!" The remains were 
hastily buried in the spot where the beautiful church 
of the Madeleine now stands, and a quantity of quick- 
lime was thrown into the grave, that they might be 
destroyed as soon as possible. 

Thus perished Louis the Sixteenth, in the thirty- 
ninth year of his age; sacrificed, not so much on 
account of his own sins as for those of his ancestors, 
who by long centuries of cruel tyranny had nourished 
the terrible drao;on that; now devoured him. He had 
wished to do what was right, but he did not know how; 
and like an unskillful engineer wath a vast responsi- 
bility suddenly thrown upon him, he fell a victim to 
the power he could not control. 




THE BEIGN OF TERROR. 311 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

THE EEIGN OF TEKROR — 1703-1794. 

|HERE is no retreat now," said Marat, one of 
the most rabid of the Red Republicans; "we 
must conquer or die." In a few weeks the 
Republic was in arms against nearly the whole of 
Europe, England joining the great confederacy. For- 
midable insurrections broke out in France itself; Gene- 
ral Duraouriez, who had before fought successfully, lost 
the battle o£ Neerwinden, and was so disgusted with the 
turn affairs had taken that he went over to the Austrians. 
It was now that the wonderful energy of the Jacobins 
prevailed against this combination of adverse forces. 
Launching their whole strength in a wild fury against 
the enemies nearest them, those at home, they stopped 
at no act of violence which could make their hold on 
power firmer. They established the Revolutionary 
Tribunal, one of the most horril^le blood-councils 
which ever disgraced a civilized nation, and turned its 
fury first on the Girondists, whom they charged with 
being enemies of the public interests. These were 
hunted down without mercy, in Paris, in the provinces, 
everywhere; the prisons were crowded. Hoping to 
deliver her country from this detestable tyranny, a 
young lady named Charlotte Corday obtained admis- 
sion to the presence of the ferocious Marat, and stabbed 
him to the heart. She was condemned to death, and 
met her sentence triumphantly — glorying in having 
rid her country of a tyrant, and not knowing how 



312 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

IVuitloss had been her efforts in the cause of freedom. 

A terrible vengeance was taken on those parts of 
the country which had risen in rebellion. Tribunals 
were erected in every city in these unhappy districts, 
and blood flowed in a ceaseless stream. When it was 
found impossible for the most industrious guillotine 
to dispose in a day of all the condemned, shorter 
methods were adopted. At Lyons the prisoners by 
hundreds at a time were taken to a long mound raised 
between two ditches dug to receive their bodies, and 
there fired upon with cannon. The first discharge did 
not kill them all; it only broke jaws and sent limbs 
flying over the field; there was a second, and a third, 
and as many persons still lived on in their agony, the 
bayonet and the sabre did the rest. Then the 
bodies (some breathing ones among them), were 
shoveled into the ditches and the earth heaped above 
them. These executions were called ,/«^5/^/«c7e5. An- 
other kind, called noyades^ consisted in filling the 
hold of a vessel with as many poor wretches as it 
would contain, towing it out into a river and then 
scuttlino- it so that all should be drowned toixether. 
What was termed a " republican marriage " was tying 
a man and woman together and throwing them into 
the water to drown. No fewer than fifteen thousand 
persons are computed to have perished in these vari- 
ous wayi in three months in the city of Nantes alone, 
and the waters of the Loire became so polluted by 
corpses that it was forbidden to drink them as being 
injurious to health. 

Among the cities which rebelled was that of Toulon, 
in the south of France, whose inhabitants called in an 



THE REIGN OF TERROR. 313 

English fleet and garrison to help them. Here for the 
lirst time we are told of a young officer called Napo- 
leon Bonaparte, whose skillful military operations com- 
pelled the British to retreat. France and the world 
were destined to hear much more of him before the 
grave closed over him at St. Helena. 

After the death of Marat, Robespierre became the 
chief of the revolutionists, and from this time m.ay be 
dated the beo^innino: of the " Reio-n of Terror." A 
series of hastily-formed laws made by the so-called 
" Committee of Public Safety," placed the lives and 
possessions of the entire French nation at the mercy 
of a band of men who for lawlessness and ferocity 
have never been equalled in the civilized world. 
" Enemy of the Republic " was the vague accusation 
on which thousands upon thousands of good citizens 
were thrown into prison, only to be subjected to the 
mockery of a trial and then hurried to a speedy death. 
x\mong the early victims we distinguish "the Widow 
Capet " — such was the name given at her trial to the 
once beautiful and haughty daughter of Maria Theresa. 
For months her life had been as wretched as the inge- 
nuity of vulgar souls could make it. A few months 
after the king's death she was forcibly separated from 
her little son, the care of whom had been a great com- 
fort to her. From that time she seemed to lose all 
hope and spirit, and would stand for hours together 
lookino; throujjh a crack in the wall, for the sake of 
sometimes seeing him pass at a distance. 

Soon she was denied even this poor satisfaction, and 
was removed from tiie Temple, where Madame Eliza- 
beth and the Princess Royal had been with her, to the 



314 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

still more wretched prison of the Conciergerie, a 
place used only for the lowest criminals. The men 
appointed to take her there came in the middle of the 
night and obliged her to rise and dress in their 
presence, searching her apparel as she put it on, to see 
that she concealed nothing. In passing through a low 
door-way she struck her forehead violently, and one of 
the men asked if she had hurt herself. " Nothing can 
hurt me now," she said. 

In the Conciergerie she was placed in a damp, filthy 
cell, in which a man was stationed, night and day, to 
watch her. She was never left alone for a moment. 
The princesses, knowing her industrious habits, wished 
to send her materials for worsted-work, that she might 
have something to pass away the dreary time, but were 
harshly refused, on the ground that there might be 
some treasonable communication between them and 
her. She managed, however, to ravel out some old 
carpet which she fomtd in her cell, and with two bits 
of wood for knitting needles, (as she was not allowed 
steel needles for fear she should stab herself with 
them), she contrived to knit a pair of garters. 

At last the time was appointed for her trial, and for 
two days she was subjected to a rigid examination 
during which the most insulting questions were asked 
her, all of which she answered with spirit and dignity. 
The verdict was, of course, death, and so great had 
been her suffering that she welcomed it as a relief. 
She was carried on a cart to the place of the guillotine 
with her hands tied, like a common criminal; her 
beautiful hair had turned white in her long agony; her 
face, now no longer lovely, but worn and haggard, 



THE REIGN OF TERROR. 315 

could scarcely have been recognized by one who knew 
it onl^^ in happier days, but her bearing was, as always, 
proud and dignified. She mounted the scaffold with 
a firm step; stretching out her hands, she exclaimed, 
"Farewell, my children; I am going to your fatlier;" 
the axe fell; the executioner heldup the bleeding head 
amid shouts of "Vive laRepublique," and all was over. 
To the eyes of republican France she was only one 
of many. The guillotine never rested. Twelve pris- 
ons in Paris, and thousands more throughout the 
country, delivered up their captives to death as fast as 
they could be emptied by the executions. The Gi- 
rondist deputies of the Convention, who had been in 
prison since the beginning of the Reign of Terror, were 
condemned in a body, and marched together to execu- 
tion singing the Marsellaise Hymn, which had been 
composed not long before by Rouget de Lisle. Madame 
Roland, one of the most distinguished of French 
thinkers and writers, exclaimed as she was carried 
to the guillotine, "Oh, Liberty! what crimes are 
committed in thy name ! " Her husband, who was not 
among the " suspected," stabbed himself on hearing 
of her death. TJie infamous " Philippe Egalite," once 
Duke of Orleans, who had shocked even the revolu- 
tionists by voting for the king's death; Bailly, the 
astronomer, first President of the National Assembly; 
the Countess Du Barry, a shameful relic of the reign 
of Louis the Fifteenth; Malesherbes, the upright min- 
ister of the next Louis, and w^ho had volunteered to 
defend him at his trial; the saint-like Madame Eliza- 
beth,, the king's sister — all followed in quick suc- 
cession, almost unnoticed among the throng wjjo 



316 HISTORY OF FRANCE, 

daily formed a mournful procession to the . scaffold. 

It was not in the name of the Christian religion that 
such things were done. The Revolutionists had 
advanced beyond that. The last person who was 
allowed to have a priest with him was the king, 
though once or twice afterward a clergyman was seen 
in the company of a condemned person, causing 
angry complaints among the spectators. The Conven- 
tion now decided that such follies should be done 
away with altogether. They proclaimed that the 
religion of Jesus Christ vv^as abolished and that death 
was an eternal sleep; churches were everywhere 
desecrated; the tombs in the cathedral of St. Denis, 
that resting-place of so many generations of French 
kings, were broken open and their contents exposed 
to the insults of the multitude. All Christian wor- 
ship was forbidden, and a festival was held in the 
ancient cathedral of Notre Dame in which an opera- 
dancer was enthroned Avith revolting ceremonies, as 
the Goddess of Reason. To wipe out as far as possible 
all remembrance of times gone by, the calendar was 
chancred and a new reckoninor was ordered to beo;in from 
the 22d of September, 1792, which took the name of 
the year I. Instead of weeks of seven days, the 
months were divided into three periods of ten days 
each, every " decadi " or tenth day being a holiday 
to replace the Christian day of rest. The months 
received different names — Windy-month, Rainy- 
month, Snowy-month, etc., and such is the power 
of habit that these absurd decrees remained in force 
until the first of January, 1806. 

The ferocity of the ruffians who despoiled the church 



THE REIGN OF TERROR. 317 

of St. Denis almost exceeds belief. Even the coffin 
of Henry the Fourth, so long the nation''s idol, was 
not spared. His body, of "which the features were 
perfectly preserved, was placed upright on a stone for 
the rabble to amuse themselves with, and a woman, 
reproaching it with having been a king, knocked it 
down by a blow in the lace. The contents of all the 
vaults were thrown in a heap into great pits contain- 
ing quick lime, which were then filled up, Avhile the 
leaden coffins were melted and cast into bullets intend- 
ed to kill the enemies of the Republic. 

The rage for condemnation now became a sort of 
insanity. Fouquier-Tinville, a man whose greatest 
delight was in the shedding of blood, was made public 
prosecutor. A word, a tear, often a look, was enough 
to render a person " suspected," and once within the 
prison walls there was little hope. " Plots in the 
prison" was now the watchword of the accusers, and it 
was a formula from which few escaped. The number 
of prisoners condemned in a day was called a "batch," 
as if they had been so many loaves of bread prepared 
for the oven. 

The prisons themselves were disgusting places, dirty, 
damp and unwholesome, but the prisoners congregated 
in them had one comfort; they were allowed to be to- 
gether. They were often left for weeks in these 
places before they were tried, and ladies and gentlemen 
who had met each other before in gay society had even 
the heart to play games in which a mock trial and a 
death by guillotine frequently figured ! 

Every day when the "batches" were called for, each 
prisoner listened eagerly for his own name, and not 



318 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

hearing it returned again to the play which the sum- 
mons had interrupted. Poor souls ! let us not grudge 
them these efforts at self-consolation. Others there 
were of nobler natures who spent their time in strength- 
ening the weak, encouraging the timid, consoling the 
bereaved; and w^ho, when their turn came to go, set such 
an example of noble resignation as lifted up the hearts 
of those left behind to their own level of unselfish 
patience. 

Outside of the prisons, the habit of witnessing execu- 
tions had an unspeakably brutalizing effect on the 
common people. The daily murder became a festival, 
where seats were prepared as in a theatre. Women 
took their knitting and went several hours beforehand 
to secure the best places, exchanging jokes and con- 
gratulations while the hideous spectacle was going on. 
The higher classes, as a rule, met death with firmness 
and dignity, and in silence. Those not yet " suspect- 
ed" lived in continual terror, none knowing when the 
axe would be lifted over their heads. The sight of a 
strano;e face in their houses, the sound of a bell or of 
an unknown voice filled them with alarm. Many 
committed suicide in their wretchedness, unable to 
endure the suspense. 

All parties in the convention were not yet, however, 
subdued to Robespierre's will, and he caused Danton, 
Camille Desmoulins and others who still preserved 
their independence, to be guillotined. The pride of 
Robespierre was now at its height. Resistance to his 
will had ceased, but the work of death went on more 
ferociously than ever. It seemed as if he felt his only 
chance of safety to be in the ceaseless shedding of 



THE REIGN OF TERROR. 319 

blood. With much pompous formalitj he re-estab- 
lished the worship of a Supreme Being about a year 
after the enthronement of the Goddess of Reason, 
and a festival was held on the occasion, in which 
Robespierre himself was plainly intended to be the 
one honored. But he had at last overstepped the 
bounds of patience, and his ruin was resolved upon. 

All arranirements were made in the deepest secrecy, 
and the tyrant was thunderstruck when he found him- 
self suddenly denounced before the Convention as one 
whose death was necessary to the safety of the Repub- 
lic. In vain he tried to make himself heard; too many 
of the members were in dread of his over^-rown 
jjower, and he was quickly condemned, with all his 
trusted associates. He tried to shoot himself in prison, 
but only inflicted a hideous wound on his face, shatter- 
ing the jaw. As he was carried to execution, lying 
on a cart and almost dead already with cringing terror, 
the people shouted for joy; w^omen danced around him, 
curses and jeers followed him to the scaffold. There 
he was stretched out on the ground until his turn came, 
for he was too far gone to stand; his eyes opened and he 
saw the bloody axe; Samson, the executioner, roughly 
tore off his coat and with it the dirty linen bandage 
with which his broken jaw had been bound up; a 
frightful spectacle was exhibited, a horrible cry escaped 
from him, and soon his liead was held up to the applaud- 
ing crowd: Robespierre was no more. 

The revolution which caused his downfall is called 
that of the 9thThermidor, (July 28th 1794). For some 
time the revolutionary axe was kept at work on the 
mifecreants who had been accomplices in his bloody 



320 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

deeds, Fouquier-Tinville and such as he meeting the 
fate they had been dealing out to others. Figures do 
not help us much in estimating scenes like these, but 
it is said that fourteen hundred persons were executed 
in Paris alone during the six weeks preceding Robes- 
pierre's death. In the course of a few months ten 
thousand were released from the different prisons, and 
the Convention was mainly occupied in sentencing to 
death its own members, as each party in turn obtained 
the ascendency. At length order was restored among 
them and they began to turn their attention to the 
affairs of the country. 




CIIAPTEB XXXIII. 

THE DIBECTORT. DAY OF THE SECTION'S. 1795. 

HILE unspeakable horrors were taking place 
in France, the armies of the Republic were 
maintaining the honor of the country against 
the great European coalition with a bravery beyond 
praise. The absolute dictatorship of the Convention 
enabled it to pour out enormous numbers of men 
for the service, and as nobility was not a qualification 
for promotion as it had been before the Revolution, 
every man felt that his rising from the ranks depended 
on himself alone, and fought accordingly. Under 
Generals Pichegru, Jourdan and Hoche, the French 
armies were repeatedly successful, and Holland, the 
first fruits of the new policy, was conquered and turned 



DIRECTORY. DAY OF THE SECTIONS. 321 

into a Republic. The campaign in this country 
presented the remarkable spectacle of the capture of a 
fleet by a land-force, the Dutch ships being frozen into 
the river Waal, and falling an easy prey to the French 
infantry. Conquests were made from Spain and 
Prussia, and these powers were the first among the 
great European nations to consent to terms of peace 
and acknowledge the independence of the new 
Kepublic. 

By sea the French were not so fortunate. Lord 
Howe won a great naval victory over them off Ushant, 
and they had to give up their part of St. Domingo in 
the West Indies to Spain, while Corsica, helped by 
England, set itself free again. 

One of the conditions demanded by Spain before 
signing the treaty of peace was that the unhappy 
children of Louis the Sixteenth should be delivered 
up to the their natural protectors, the royal family of 
Austria. The Convention hesitated about consenting 
to this article, and while the negotiations were still 
pending, the prince died. The sad story of this poor 
boy's life, then imperfectly known or only guessed at, 
was afterwards revealed by the accounts of his sister, 
who had been imprisoned with him, and of others 
who were witnesses of his fate. A course of system- 
atic cruelty at last destroyed both his mind and body, 
and he died in June, 1795. His sister was then re- 
stored to her friends in Austria, and subsequently 
married her cousin, the Duke d' Angouleme; but the 
remembrance of the dreadful scenes of her youth never 
faded from her mind, and she remained always melan- 
choly and unhappy. 
21 



322 HISTOBY OF FRANCE. 

Successful in arms abroad, France was no less so in 
repressing insurrections at home. In La Vendee a 
revolt broke out which cost on both sides a hundred 
thousand lives; but in the end it was put down. The 
Royal party in Brittany, under the name of Chouans^ 
(night-owls), for a long time kept up a desperate strug- 
gle, with the same result. Unsparing severity was 
used towards tho vanquished, and the stories of want 
and desolation which followed are pitiful to read. 

The whole country was in a state of great financial 
distress. The millions of confiscated property did not 
go to the support of the poor, but to keep up the enor- 
mous armies with which France was holdino^ her ene- 
mies at bay, and the number of men drawn away by 
war from trade and a2:riculture caused serious loss to 
both. Government employment was of all things most 
dreaded, for the payment, being made in the wretched 
assignats which were daily decreasing in value, was so 
inadequate that men resigned their ofiices rather than 
give their labor for what would not support them. 
Most vexatious and arbitrary laws had been passed in 
the days of the terror, regulating not only the price 
of merchandise but even the quantity to be bought 
so that the population of Paris could not buy bread at 
the baker's without first procuring tickets from the 
authorities. The cry of " Bread ! Bread !" became 
the terror of the government, and it was a continual 
problem with the Convention how to content tlie peo- 
ple and yet keep its own hold on power. 

The experiment of uniting in one body all the 
classes which had formerly composed the States-Gen- 
eral was considered to have failed. It was resolved 



DIRECTORY. DAY OF THE SECTIONS, 323 

that the National Lea:islature should consist of two 
bodies — a Council of Five Hundred which was to 
propose the laws, and a Council of Ancients, (so 
called because no one could serve in it who was less 
than forty years old), to discuss them, and either 
accept or reject them. The power of carrying 
them out was to be in the hands of five persons 
called a Directory. So far all were agreed, but when 
the Convention added a condition that two-thirds of 
the council should be appointed from its own members, 
a violent opposition was aroused, instigated by the 
Royalists, wlio had no mind thus to see the Revolu- 
tionary government perpetuate itself, and hoped 
gradually to gain a voice in public affairs. 

Preparations were made for resisting the decree by 
force, and several of the "sections," of Paris, (a 
division corresponding somewhat to the "wards "of 
our own cities, but with a certain amount of independ- 
ent action), were gained over by the Royalists. The 
plan was submitted to a vote by the people of the 
whole country and accepted by an immense majority, 
but the rebellious sections had no thought of yielding. 
In this emergency the command of an armed force to 
quell the insurgents was given to that same young 
lieutenant named Bonaparte who had done good 
service in driving away the English from Toulon. 
He was appointed to conduct the operations against 
the sections, and made his arrangements with such 
skill and promptness that when the expected rising 
of the people occurred, he was completely victorious. 
This success, which took place on what is called "The 
Day of the Sections," raised Bonaparte to the highest 



324 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

place in public esteem, and he was soon afterwards 
named Commander-in-chief. From this time imtil 
the battle of Waterloo the interest of French history 
centres about this remarkable man, all the actions of 
others seeming insignificant by the side of his bril- 
liant military career. 

The Convention showed great moderation and 
clemency in its victory over the Sections; only one 
man was pat to death and a few imprisoned. A 
general pardon was issued to all who had been con- 
victed for political offences, except those already 
sentenced to transportation, and the prison doors 
were thrown open; but the emigrants who had fled 
from their coimtry to save their lives in the beginning 
of the Revolution were especially excluded from this 
amnesty. The Convention could not forgive this act 
of desertion. Belgium, which had been conquered 
by the armies of the Republic, was declared to be 
annexed to France. The " Place de la Revolution," 
— the spot where the guillotine had shed the blood of 
thousands, — was thenceforth to be called the "Place de 
la Concorde," which name it still bears. "When these 
decrees had been passed, the president pronounced 
the words " The National Convention declares that 
its mission has been accomplished and its session is 
closed," and the assembly broke up amid shouts of 
"Vive la Republique!" on the 26th of October, 1795. 

An immense majority of the people of France still 
preferred the Republic, in spite of all its horrors arid 
its follies, to the long tyranny which had j)receded it. 
The five members of the Directory were all Repub- 
licans, and had voted for the death of the king. Two 



DIRECTORY. DAY OF THE SECTIONS. 325 

of them, Barras and Carnot, were men of ability and 
experience; the names of the others need not be 
remembered. The Luxembourg palace was assigned 
to them for their meetings, but so universal had been 
the destruction that when they went there to enter 
upon their duties there was not a piece of furniture 
to be found in the building. They borrowed a wooden 
table which was hobbling upon three legs, the fourth 
havino- tumbled out from old ao-e: and this with some 
chairs, also borrowed, completed their outfit. They 
were not discouraged, however, but then and there 
determined boldly to meet every obstacle and rescue 
their country from its depth of misery. 

From this discoura^'ino; state of affairs at home, the 
mind of the French could soon turn with pleasure to 
the glorious spectacle of Bonaparte's successes in 
foreign countries. From the moment of his assuming 
the command of the army, its path was one steady 
career of victory. The soldiers under his command 
were in a wretched state of distress and insubordina- 
tion, occasioned by the want of proper provisions and 
clothing, but his animating spirit prevailed over all 
discourao-ements, and his efficient measures brouorht 
order out of confusion. His men forgot that they were 
hungry and cold and weary while he was leading them 
on to glory. To the end of his life, those who were 
accustomed to personal contact with him regarded him 
(uidess they happened to quarrel) with an affection 
little short of idolatry. 

Bonaparte was, as we know, a Corsican. From his 
earliest years he loved nothing so well as playing 
soldier, and inspired all his companions with the same 



326 HISTORY OF FBANCE. 

spirit. At ten years old he Avas sent to the military 
school at Brienno, in France, whore he received a 
thorough military education. The following is tlie 
certiiicate given him at (iftoen years of age, and copied 
afterwards by one of his classmates: 

" M. de Buonaparte,* born Aug. 15, 1759, height 4 
feet 10 indies, has finished his fourth course; of good 
constitution, excellent health, of submissive disposition, 
upright, oTateful, and strictly regular in conduct; has 
always been distinguished for application to the mathe- 
matics. He is tolerably well acquainted with history 
and geography. He is i-ather deficient in the orna- 
mental branches and in Latin, in which he has barely 
completed the fourth course. He will make an ex- 
cellent seaman. He is fit to pass to the military school 
at Paris." 

It must have been hard for Bonaparte ever to have 
kept up the appearance of a "submissive disposition," 
for his whole character, as shown during his life, bears 
the marks of an overpowering arrogance and self-will. 
He graduated with honor irom the school at Paris, 
and received a commission as sub-lieutenant in the 
army, but had no opportunity to distinguish himself 
until he drove away the British from Toulon in 1703. 
During this time he was very poor, and being at the 
same time very proud, he became somewhat misan- 
thropic, and inclined to look on the world as a very 
disagreeable place; but this ceased as soon as he had 
any opportunity of employing his ever restless and 

*His family name was thus spelt. He left out the «■ during his 
first campaign in Italy, to make the spelling correspond with 
the French pronunciation. 



DUiECTORY. DAY OF THE SECTIONS. 327 

active mind. After the Day of the Sections he 
was frequently obliged to quell the disturbances 
which vvere everywhere taking place. He was at that 
time twenty-six years old. He is said to have been 
then extremely thin, and of a dark, sallow complex- 
ion. As he was one day haranguing the crowd on the 
folly of their course, a corpulent woman screamed 
out, " Never mind what these smartly-dressed officers 
say; so long as they get fat, they don't care who is 
starved." Bonaparte turned toward her and instantly 
replied, " Look at me, my good woman, and then tell 
me which of us two is the fatter." The crowd burst 
into a roar of laughter, and dispersed. A few days 
after the affair of the Sections a young lad of ten 
3'^ears old came to Bonaparte to implore that the 
sword of his father. Viscount B.^auharnais, who had 
been guillotined during the Reign of Terror, might be 
restored to him. Touched by the little lad's tears 
and supplications, the general ordered that the sword 
should be given up to him. The mother of the boy, 
a beautiful young widow, called on Bonaparte to 
thank him for the favor, and this acquaintance led to 
a marriao;e between them, so in the course of a few 
months Josephine Beauharnais became Madame Bona- 
parte. The widow had two children; Eugene, the 
boy already mentioned, and a daughter called Hortense, 
who afterward married one of Napoleon's brothers. 




328 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

CHAPTER XXXIV, 

bonapaete's fiust campaigns. — 1796-1799. 

FIE Republic, as will be remembered, was still 
at war with the Austrians, who had a large 
army in the northern part of Italy. With a 
force numbering scarcely more than half of theirs, Bona- 
parte marched against them in 1796, and b}'- a series 
of most brilliant military operations, defeated them at 
all points. It does not accord with the plan of this 
slight sketch to give the particulars of this wonderful 
campaign. It was a succession of surprises to the 
enemy, who never knew where the next blow would 
fall, so rapid were the movements of Bonaparte and 
so unexpected his combinations. The names of the 
great battles at Lodi, iVrcole and Rivoli — all glorious 
victories — are all we have space for here. It was after 
the first of these that the soldiers bestowed on him the 
nickname of " the little Corporal," which clung to 
him throuo'h life. 

Encouraged by these successes, Bonaparte determined 
to pursue the retreating army into its own territory, 
and had advanced to Leoben, seventy-live miles from 
Vienna, when the discomfited Austrians sent to beg 
for a suspension of arms. This was granted by the 
conqueror, who, after signing the preliminary articles 
of a peace, returned into Italy, which at that time was 
divided into various governments. Sardinia had its 
king, Lombardy was under the control of Austria, 
Venice still kej^t up a show of independence, the pope 



BONAPARTE'S FIRST CAMPAIGNS, 329 

reigned in the " States of the Church," tlie king of 
Naples had dominion over all Southern Italy, and 
various dukes and princes governed the remainder. 
As far as Bonaparte's victories extended he exacted 
contributions from all, and, not content with enormous 
demands in money, robbed the different sovereigns of 
their choicest works of art, the accumulations of cen- 
turies. Pictures, statuary, manuscripts — whatever was 
most valuable and most prized, — were taken to Paris, 
and for nearly twenty years adorned the galleries of the 
Luxembourg and the Louvre. France gained bef 
sides these the countries of Sivoy and Nice, and the 
right to keep garrisons in many of the most impor- 
tant cities of Italy. 

The helpless Pope, after being stripped of his pos- 
sessions, even the jewels which formed part of his dress 
being taken fiom him, was removed from place to 
place, and finally taken to France, where he died. The 
ancient commonwealth of Venice, havin'r risen a;2rainst 
the garrisons left there by Bonaparte while he was 
marching into Germany, was seized by the French, 
and, after all its centuries of freedom, was turned over 
to Austria at the Treaty of Campo Formio, by which 
Bonaparte finally made peace. France was now con- 
firmed in the possession of Be'gium, together with the 
coveted "Ithine boundary," while a large portion of 
territory in Northern Italy, taken from several differ- 
ent states, was formed into a single one called the 
"Cisalpine Republic." It reads like a dream, this 
wonderful panorama of conquests made with a com- 
paratively small number of men, and passing so rapidly 
that before the news of one success reached the ears 



330 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



of the astonished nations, another had been gained. 
A French writer says of Bonaparte at this period that 
" these victories gave him the tone of a master, and he 
never laid it aside." 

After the treaty of Campo Formio, Bonaparte 
returned to Paris, where he had a magnificent recep- 
tion. He spent several months there very quietly 
with Josephine, devoting himself to study, and avoid- 
ing any appearance of wishing to attract attention. 
But he was revolving in his mind an idea which had 
long occupied it, — that of a military expedition to 
Egypt. Tlie Directory did not embrace the plan very 
eagerly at first, but finally consented, as is said, chiefly 
that so dano-erous a rival mio-ht be removed from their 
own vicinity. 

Magnificent preparations were made for this great 
expedition, which included as a part of its equipment 
a large number of men of learning, or, as the French 
call them, savans. These were to make a study of the 
geography, natural history and antiquities of Egypt, 
and advance the cause of science in France as much as 
the men of war were to advance her military dominion. 
On the wa^'-, Bonaparte stopped and took possession of 
the Island of Malta, which was given up to him by 
the Knights of St. John, who had held it since it was 
bestowed upon them by Charles the Fifth in 1525. 

The army landed in Egypt near Alexandria, and 
having taken that city with but little opposition, 
proceeded to Cairo. Although Egypt belonged nomi- 
nally to the Sultan of Turkey and was ruled by a 
governor subject to him, the real enemies Bonaparte 
had to contend with there were the Mamelukes, who 



BONAPARTE'S FIRST CAMPAIGNS. 331 

were among the best soldiers in the world, and formed, 
with their officers, a kind of military despotism. 
Near Cairo was fought the Battle of the Pyramids, 
before which Bonaparte exclaimed to his soldiers, 
"Remember that from the summits of those pyramids 
forty centuries are looking down upon you!" The 
Mamelukes fought desperately, but were defeated 
with great loss, and Cairo with all the surrounding 
country fell into the hands of the French. 

A great reverse of fortune followed this triumph. 
The fleet, which had been left in Aboukir Bay (among 
the mouths of the Nile) was attacked and destroyed 
by the English under Lord Nelson. This is the 
famous action called " The Battle of the Nile," in 
which the incident occurred known to our schoolboys 
by Mrs. Hemans's poem of " Casabianca." Thus cut 
off from all communication with his country, Bona- 
parte profited by his isolation to form new schemes of 
conquest. He organized a government for Egypt, and 
kept the natives in awe by merciless severity. The 
Sultan, encouraged by the triumph of the British, now 
declared war against France, and Bonaparte, not 
waiting to be attacked, marched into Syria with his 
army. Here he took the town of Jaffa by storm, and 
ordered two thousand Turkish prisoners to be mur- 
dered in cold blood. He then attacked Acre, and in 
the course of the siege inflicted a bloody defeat on 
the Turks at the foot of Mount Tabor; but the brav- 
ery of the garrison, aided by Sir Sydney Smith, who 
was in command of an English fleet in the harbor, 
checked him, and he was compelled to abandon Syria 
and return to Egypt. 



HISTOBY OF FRANCE. 



His visions of a magnificent Oriental empire had 
faded into air, but the return through the desert was a 
terrible reality. The scorching heat of a Syrian summer, 
the intolerable thirst, (for there was no water to be had), 
and above all that dreadful disease called the plague, 
made the march a scene of frightful suffering. Many 
wounded soldiers were thrown on the sands to die, 
bitterly reproaching their comrades for their desertion. 
All villages that lay in their way and the rich crops 
waiting to be harvested were set on fire, apparently 
throuo-h verv wantonness, for their destruction could do 
no good to the plague-stricken host, and no resistance 
was offered. At last the sadly-diminished army reached 
Egypt and were allowed to rest for a short time at 
Cairo. The Turks had in the meantime landed an 
army at Aboukir, which Bonaparte attacked and de- 
feated with tremendous slausi-hter. Learninir from the 
newspapers the confusion which prevailed in France 
under the Director}^ he took the extraordinary res- 
olution of abandoning his army and returning at once, 
without orders, to France. As a military commander he 
was of course under the direction of the authorities 
ihrro, and under a strong government would have been 
liable to be court-martialed for such a disregard of 
duty; but he understood the situation, and determined 
to make himself master of it. 

His preparations for leaving Egypt were made 
secretly, for he was doing a thing against all law and 
system. He left General Kleber in command of the 
" Army of the East," and gratified the soldiers by 
causing the names of the forty men who fell in the 
attack at Alexandria to be engraved on Pompoy's Pillar, 



BONAPARTE'S FIRST CAMPAIGNS. 333 

in that city. The savans were, after all, those who 
reaped the most benefit from the unfruitful expedition 
to Eg3'-pt. They returned home with a great addition 
to their stock of scientific knowledge, and with a dis- 
covery which alone, to them, was worth the whole ex- 
pedition. Tliis was that of the famous Rosetta Stone, 
a monument of antiquity which, by presenting an in-' 
scription in tlie old Egyptian characters at the same 
time with a translation in Greek, has since enabled 
learned men to read the Egyptian records of remote 
ages. Bonaparte's foresight had not deceived him. 
His journey through France was one continued ovation, 
his countrymen recognizing instantly in him the master- 
spirit who alone could end the chaos which reigned 
there. Everywhere on the road complaints met liim 
of the miserable inefficiency of the Directors. Anx- 
ious only to secure their own power, they had utterly 
neglected to provide for the prosperity of the nation. 
Threatened with a foreign invasion and groaning 
under tyrannical laws at home, civil war raging in many 
districts, the highways infested with robbers and un- 
safe for travelers, it is no wonder that the people of 
France complained bitterly of a government " without 
power, without justice and without morality." On 
the one hand there appeared before their eyes the 
prospect of another Reign of Terror, on the other, 
that of a return of the Bourbons. Either was to be 
dreaded, and they longed for security without tyranny, 
and liberty without anarchy. 

"Their Five Majesties of the Directory," as the 
Directors were generally called, had found it hard work 
to hold their own. There had been revolutions and 



334 HISTOEY OF FRANCE, 

counter-revolutions; at one time the Royalists had the 
majority in the^ Council of Five Hundred, at another 
the Jacobins, and as each party triumphed in turn, 
it undid all the vv^ork done by the other. Now we find 
the Count de Provence, (oldest brother of Louis the 
Sixteenth and heir to the throne), making arrange- 
•ments to return; at another, the public exercise of the 
Christian religion is prohibited, and emigrants who were 
forbidden under the most severe penalties to depart 
from their native land, are forbidden to return. 

Foreign nations had not been backward in taking 
advantage of the distracted state of affairs in France. 
The arrogance of the Directory caused a second com- 
bination to be made against it, and the French armies 
were repeatedly defeated in Italy. For a time Bona- 
parte kept still and watched the course of events, 
taking no part in public alfairs, and even laying aside 
his general's uniform. He gathered his friends quietly 
about him, making sure of all beforehand. The Abbe 
Sieyes, a restless politician who had been prominent 
in the revolution of 1789, thought he had discovered 
just what the country needed; it was a head and a 
sword. He evidently flattered himself that his own was 
to be the head, and he was willing to accept Bonaparte 
as the sword. Between them they settled on a plan 
which brought about another revolution — this time, 
fortunately, effected without bloodshed. 

Bonaparte was appointed to the command of the 
army in Paris. All things being prepared for 

the coup d'^4tat^ he appeared before the Council of 

V • 

*This term is one for which we have no equivalent in Eng- 
lish. It means a sudden and unexpected political blow. 



BONAPARTE'S FIBST CAMPAIGNS. 335 

Five Hundred, who received him with angry reproaches, 
some of them even proposing to denounce him as a 
public enemy. For a moment he quailed before them; 
then, retiring, he sent in a file of grenadiers, who in a 
few minutes cleared the hall without firino*. A small 
number of those members favorable to him were now 
brought together by his brother Lucien, Avho was presi- 
dent of the Council. These, in connection with the 
Council of Ancients, which was on his side, voted to abol- 
ish the Directory; a large number of the Five Hundred 
were condemned to banishment, and the chief power was 
given to Napoleon Bonaparte and two others, who were 
all elected for ten years, under the name of Consuls. A 
Tribunate, a Legislative Chamber and a Senate were 
added, to give the government an appearance of being 
representative; but in fact all power was soon centred 
in the hands of Bonaparte as First Consul. 

Thus peaceably was this great change effected. The 
people in general v/ero so disgusted with the old govern- 
ment that when the matter was referred to their decision, 
the votes in favor of the new constitution proposed by 
Bonaparte and his colleagues were three millions against 
fifteen hundred. His splendid military achievements 
had dazzled their eyes, and they never asked whether 
his elevation to power would advance the cause of that 
freedom which they had been struggling so desperately 
for ten years to obtain. The immediate result hoped 
for was a rule of peace and order, and that being in- 
sured they asked nothing more. The coup d'etat occur- 
red on the 18th Brumaire, year VH. of the Republic, 
(Novem})er 9, 1799), and maybe considered as the 
closing scene in the great French Revolution. 



336 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

CHAPTER XXXY, 

THE CONSULATE. 1799-1804. 




T was easy to recognize the hand of a master 
as soon as Bonaparte took hold of the govern- 
ment. The churches were re-opened, the 
Christian Sunday again took the place of the heathen- 
ish " decadi," emigrants were welcomed home, great 
numbers of priests who had refused to take the oath 
to the " Constitution of the year III.," (1795), were 
released from the prisons where they had been lan- 
guishing for years, highway robbery was stopped, and 
last but not least, the public credit revived and people 
were no longer afraid to trust the government. 

Order was restored, but not liberty. The newspa- 
pers opposed to the First Consul were all suppressed, 
and a system of espionage, or spying, under the 
direction of the celebrated Fouche, minister of 
police, was established throughout the country. Every- 
thing was silently preparing for another great change, 
and events moved forward towards Bonaparte's as- 
sumption of supreme power as surely as the hands of 
a clock draw nearer the hour. He removed his resi- 
dence from the Luxembourg palace, where the Direc- 
tory had met, to the Tuileries. " To sleep in the 
Tuileries" had long been an object of his ambition, 
and he had the ancient palace fitted up with great 
splendor. Some artist of the Republic had painted 
divers liberty caps on the walls as part of. the decora- 
tion. " Take away that rubbish," said the dictator 



THE CONSULATE. 337 

whoti he saw it; "I don't want any such stuff 
here." So the caps were painted out, as the thing 
they typified was soon to take its departure also. 

The war with Austria, in spite of the treaty of Campo 
Formio, was reeominonccd in 1800 with ^rcat fury. 
Again Italy was the battle-ground, and her beautiful 
plains were once more trampled down by opposing 
armies. Bonaparte, having engaged two divisions of 
the Austrian army at a great distance apart, formed 
the resolution of crossing the Alps by difficult and 
dangerous passes, and appearing just where he was 
least expected. The exertions made in carrying out 
this bold design were almost superhuman. Not only 
men but cannon, bafrffajro and ammunition had to be 
carried over nearly impassable mountains. The genius 
of the general and the endurance of his army over- 
came every obstacle. The cannon were placed in 
hollow logs and dragged over the precipitous roads by 
men harnessed to them like horses, a hundred to each 
piece. The men shouted and sang as they marched, 
and when an unusually hard place was to be passed the 
trumpet sounded a charge, as if they were rushing into 
battle. The gun-carriages were taken to pieces and 
carried on the backs of mules. In spite of a thousand 
dangers the passage was safely accomplished, and the 
BVench army, arriving at Milan, took possession of that 
city without opposition. 

The Austrian general would not believe the report 
that Bonaparte had actually crossed the Alps with an 
army. Such a thing had never been heard of since 
the days of Hannibal; in fact, it was "impossible." 
Bonaparte and his army were there, nevertheless, and 
22 



8;3S HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the desperate battle of Marengo, near Milan, resulted 
once more in the success of the Frencli, though they 
but narrowly escaped a defeat, and the brave General 
Desaix was slain. Many fortresses were given up by 
the enemy, an armistice was agreed upon until terms of 
peace could be settled, and Bonaparte returned to Paris 
to receive the laurels which he had so well earned. A 
few months after this General Morcau attacked the Aus- 
trians in their own territory and won the battle of 
Hohenlinden, scarcely less glorious than that of 
Marengo. They were now quite ready to conclude 
a peace, and the Treaty of Luneville which followed 
was nearly a repetition of that of Campo Formio. 

Great Britain was still carrying on the war. An 
expedition was sent out which took possession of 
Malta and proceeded to Egypt. General Kleber, who 
was left in command there by Bonaparte, had been 
assassinated on the day of the battle of Marengo, 
and his place was taken by General Menou — a very 
absurd person, who adopted the Mahometan religion 
and married a Turkish wife. This officer was not 
able to resist the English under Sir Ralph Aber- 
cromby, and agreed to abandon Egypt altogether. 

The great English statesman, William Pitt, had 
always been bitterly opposed to making peace with 
Bonaparte. He was terribly grieved by the continual 
successes of the young conqueror; it is said that when 
he heard of the victory at Marengo, he exclaimed in 
despair, "Fold up the map of Europe for the next twenty 
years." But both sides were tired of war, as well they 
might be. Mr. Pitt retired from office, and a treaty 
was signed at Amiens in 1802, which left the relations 



THE CONSULATE. 339 

of France and England very much as they had been 
before the war began. l!i the same year Napoleon 
Bonaparte was made Consul for life. Step .by step he 
was nearing the summit of power and grandeur. It 
was now that this wonderful man had an opportunity 
of showing that he was no less great in peace than in 
war. Nothing escaped his far-reaching mind. Manu- 
factures, commerce, education, arts and sciences, pub- 
lic works which are to this day the wonder of travelers 
and the pride of France, institutions of learning, 
museums, libraries, all occupied his attention and 
sprang into life and j^rospered under his auspices. 
TJie Roman Catholic religion was declared to be the 
religion of the French people, and the government 
bound itself to make provision for the clergy. An 
Order of Merit called the Lecfion of Honor was foun- 
ded to reward people who had served the state well, 
whether as soldiers or in their civil capacity. From 
this none were to be excluded on account of low birth; 
thus emulation was excited, and honor conferred where 
honor was due. 

In one instance his usual'^scrimination failed him. 
Robert Fulton presented to his notice an invention for 
using steam in propelling boats against the stream, 
but Bonaparte, having a prejudice (perhaps founded 
on experience) against inventors, refused to listen to 
him. A few years later, America gave the welcome 
which France had refused, and the first steamboat 
sailed up the Hudson River. 

The most striking achievement in this reorganization 
was the institution of the great system of civil law, 
which is still the one prevailing in France. The 



340 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

" Code Napoleon " is the admiration of lawyers and 
judges in Other countries; and now, after all the great 
soldier's nailitary conquests have passed away, remains 
his most/ honorable and enduring monument. The 
system under the monarchy had been very complicated 
and various. A great writer says that a man traveling 
throuo-h France chano^ed laws oftener than he chanfred 
horses. There were at least three hundred separate 
systems. All these were superseded by the one strong, 
consistent, harmonious " Code" instituted under Bona- 
parte's orders and supervision, by a commission com- 
posed of the best lawyers of the land. 

Napoleon Bonaparte now held the proudest position 
occupied by any man in the world. The splendor of 
his military genius caused' his name to ring from one 
end of Europe to the other, and the excellence of his 
government at home, arbitrary though it was, filled 
the hearts of his countrymen with love and respect for 
him. Could he have been content with such universal 
homaace he mio-ht have made of France what- he 
would; but ambition still led him on to acts of aggres- 
sion, until in self-defence the other nations of Europe 
banded together, not so much against France, as 
against her great captain. 

Several countries in Italy were annexed to France, 
and others remodeled into republics, of which Bona- 
parte had the control, though, in some cases he pro- 
fessed to leave the administration in the hands of a 
native ruler. One would think his mission on earth 
had been to establish republics. Besides those in 
Italy, he interfered with the Swiss, who had for hun- 
dreds of years maintained their independence, and 



THE CONSULATE. 341 

compelled them to accept a constitution of his own 
selection, and to become the "Helvetic Republic." 
His single piece of ill-luck during these triumphant 
years was the loss of the colony of San Domingo, in the 
West Indies, where the black population rebelled 
against their French masters and succeeded, with some 
help from England, in gaining their freedom. Their 
leader, Toussaint I'Ouverture, was a very remarkable 
person, according to some accounts not unlike Wash- 
ington in character, but he was taken prisoner and 
carried to France, where he died. Bonaparte would 
probably have reduced the rebels to submission but 
for a frightful pestilence which broke out in the island 
and carried off great numbers of French soldiers, 
among them General ■ Leclerc, who had married 
Napoleon's sister, Pauline. 

Almost as soon as the treaty of peace with England 
was signed at Amiens the two nations began their old 
disputes, and in little more than a year they were at 
war again. Malta was the principal bone of conten- 
tion, Great Britain not having evacuated it according 
to the terms of the treaty. Each nation now taxed its 
ingenuity to discover what would do most harm to its 
opponent. Without giving notice, England seized all 
French vessels in her own harbors, inflicting an enor- 
mous loss on the French;. Bonaparte arrested all Brit- 
ish subjec^ts traveling in France and held them as 
prisoners. For years these unfortunate peo])le, who 
had crossed the Channel in great numbers after the 
peace, were cut off from their friends and relatives, 
and were in a worse position tlian ordinary prisoners 
of war, because they could not be exchanged. The 



342 • HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

war was not confined to these bloodless demonstrations. 
The French army under General Mortier conquered 
Hanover, then belonging to the English crown 
and which the dictator presented to Prussia some time 
afterward; and General Saint Cjr took possession of 
several ports in the kingdom of. Naples. But the 
grand project was an invasion of England, in which 
Bonaparte hoped to re-enact the part of William the 
Conqueror. Immense preparations were made, to 
which the whole English nation responded with pro- 
portionate plans for defence, all England being aroused 
to such patriotic fervor as had never before been wit- 
nessed. 

Bonaparte was not without enemies at home. Some 
years before, an "infenial machine " was prepared by 
the Royalists for his destruction. It consisted of a 
barrel of powder with a lighted slow-match attached, 
loaded on a cart which was placed in a street through 
which the Consul must pass on his way to the opera. 
Bonaparte's carriage passed, then Josephine's, and then 
the explosion took place, not more than a few seconds 
too late to effect the purpose for which it was designed. 
The glass in the second carriage was shattered; fifty- 
two persons were killed or wounded; but Bonaparte 
was uninjured, and went on and appeared at the opera 
as if nothing had happened. 

A more wide-spread conspiracy was organized by 
General Pichegru and a Ghouan named Cadoudal, 
having for its object the assassination of Bonaparte. 
General Moreau, who won the battle of Hohenlinden, 
was also implicated, but as it was proved that he re- 
fused to have anything to do with murder, he was only 



THE CONSULATE. 343 

banished from the country. Cadoudal and ten of his 
fellow-conspirators were executed; Pichegru commit- 
ted suicide in prison. 

In connection with these .events a crime was com- 
mitted which must forever darken the name of Napo- 
leon. The Duke of Engluen, a descendant of the 
great Conde, was accused of having been privy to the 
conspiracy. Though there was no evidence of this, 
and scarcely even a ground for suspicion, Bonaparte 
sent a party of dragoons into the territory of a neigh- 
boring German prince, under whose protection the 
Duke was living, seized him by force and brought 
him to Vincennes, near Paris, wdiere, after a mock 
trial, conducted at night, in which sentence had been 
pronounced beforehand, he was shot with indecent 
haste. Bonaparte tried to excuse this murder, (for it 
wa^ nothing else), by saying that it was an act of 
necessity; but the feeling caused by it throughout 
Europe was one of indignation and disgust. 

The events just described probably hastened a step 
on which the First Consul had long before decided — 
the transformation of* the so-called French Republic 
into an Empire. The Senate and the Legislative 
Chamber agreed that republican institutions had not 
proved adequate to the necessities of the country, and 
that a more stable government was indispensable; 
they therefore proclaimed Napoleon Bonaparte Em- 
peror of the French, the throne being made heredita- 
ry in his family. This proposition being put to the vote 
of the whole nation, was accepted by an enormous 
majority, in 1804. 

And now behold France fastening on# herself 



344 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

deliberately the yoke of hereditary jDOwer which she had 
poured out so much blood and money to shake off! 
Sir Walter Scott says, "France in 1792 had been like 
the wild elephant in his fits of fury, when to oppose 
his course is death; in 180-4 she was like the same 
animal tamed and trained, who kneels down and suf- 
fers himself to be mounted by the soldiers whose 
business it is to drive him into the throng of the 
battle." 

From this time we know Bonaparte only under his 
Christian name, such beino- the custom in reo^-ard to 
royal persons. The first king of the house of Tudor 
or of Capet dropped his family name on coming to 
the throne, and the Corsican soldier would be no 
whit behind them. He was crowned in the Cathedral 
of Notre Dame, at Paris, with the utmost splendor, by 
Pope Pius the Seventh, who came from Italy express- 
ly for the purpose. AVhen the Pope would have 
placed the crown upon his head, Napoleon took it 
into his own hands and put it on, disdaining to yield 
to any one else even this symbolical act of power. 
He himself would be all in all. With his own hand, 
also, he crowned the lovely Josephine, who knelt 
before him, and the old church resounded with the 
grand anthem " Te Deum.*" 

In accordance with the custom of the early empe- 
rors. Napoleon wished also to be crowned King of 
Italy, and having by the touch of his w^and transform- 
ed the Cisalpine Republic into a monarchy, he w^ent. 
to Milan, and there in the cathedral assumed the "iron 
crown" of the ancient Kings of Lombardy. This 
diadem took its name from a thin band of iron (said 



THE EMPIRE. 345 



to have been made from the nails of the true cross) 
concealed under the velvet and precious stones which 
form the outside. Napoleon's step-son, Eugene de 
Beauharnais, was sent to Italy as Viceroy, while the 
emperor busied himself with his preparations for the 
invasion of Eun-land. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE EMPIRE. — 1804-1814. 




I'EFORE his coronation, Napoleon held a grand 



review of the "army of England" at Bou 
logne, where, seated in the thousand-years 
old cli;dr of Dagobert, which he caused to be trans- 
ported from Paris for the occasion, he distributed 
crosses of the Legion of Honor among his soldiers, 
whom his presence never failed to fdl with the wildest 
enthusiasm. After becoming Emperor, he made over- 
tures of peace to England, addressing George the 
Third as his " brothei-;" but was told, through the 
secretary of state, that Great Britain could do nothing 
without consulting the other European powers. The 
ministry in that country was now again in the hands 
of Pitt, and all felt sure, by this time, that the Empe- 
I'or was not sincere in his professed desire for peace. 
England entered into another league with Russia and 
Austria against their grasping "brother;" and when 
an Austrian army took the field with the purpose of 
recovering some of the places which had been seized 



346 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

by Napoleon, the army intended to invade England 
was hastily withdrawn from the Channel coast and 
marched into Germany without delay. 

In three v^^eeks, and without any great battle, the 
eighty thousand men composing the Austrian force 
were taken prisoners or dispersed by the consummate 
skill of Napoleon, who entered Vienna as a conqueror 
and established himself in the imperial palace. From 
the cannon found in the arsenals was made the famous 
column in the Place Vendome at Paris. 

In the midst of the exultation produced by such 
successes as these, news came from the coast of Spain 
which would have dampened the spirits of any other 
nation than the French. The battle of Trafalgar, 
fought by the English under Lord Nelson against the 
French fleet, had resulted in the almost total destruction 
of Napoleon's navy. Dreaded as he was on land, the 
moment he ventured to dispute with Enghand the em- 
pire of the seas, he was overwhelmed. The unfortu- 
nate Admiral Villeneuve, who had commanded the 
French shijDS in the action, committed suicide while 
awaiting his trial by court-martial for the loss of the 
battle. After this, Napoleon sent no more fleets to sea. 
Before he returned to his own country, however, the 
battle of Austerlitz, that masterpiece of military skill, 
had effaced from men's minds all thoughts of the naval 
misfortune. This has been called "the battle of the three 
emperors," for Francis of Austria and Alexander of 
Russia witnessed from a neio^hborino^ hill the destruc- 
tion of their magnificent armies. They fled from the 
scene, and at the Peace of Presburg which followed, 
Napoleon was again the arbiter of nations. Slices 



THE EMPIRE. 347 



were cut from Austria in various places and bestowed 
upon her neiglibors at the will of the mighty autocrat, 
while the Czar of all the Russias was tliankful to be 
allowed to reth'e unmolested to his own dominions. 

Austria and Russia humbled and England silenced, 
Napoleon now turned his attention towards the South. 
A slight pretext was sufficient to draw from him the 
declaration that " the House of Bourbon had ceased to 
reign in Naples;" the royal family withdrew to Sicily 
and the vicant throne was filled by Joseph Bonaparte, 
the elder bi-other of the Emperor. His brother Louis 
was made King of Holland, while dukedoms and prin- 
cipalities rewarded the brave generals who had been 
made " Marshals of France" after his coronation. The 
"Confederacy of the Rhine" was entered into by 
various German Princes, who at his command declared 
themselves forever separated from Germany, and that 
ancient empire, which had existed for a thousand years, 
was broken up. Francis the Second, who had been 
Emperor of Germany, dropped that title and called 
himself Emperor of Austria, of which country he had 
before been Grand-Duke. There was not another 
Emperor of Germany until 1871. 

The King of Prussia had not been warned ijy the 
fate of his neio-hbors. Resentino- an affront offered 
him by Napoleon, he raised a great army and placed in 
command of it the Duke of Brunswick, who had com- 
manded the armies allied against France in 1792. At 
the battle of Jena this splendid host was routed with 
terrible carnage, and the king and queen fled in haste 
from their capital, where Napoleon fixed his headquar- 
ters. Here he displayed all the insolence of triumph. 



348 HISTORY OF FBANCE. 

The royal family were insulted, the richly-stored 
galleries and museums robbed of their tre:isures of 
art, and the nobility treated with galling contempt. 
In the " Berlin Decrees," issued at this time, Napoleon 
reached the last extreme of assumption. As he could 
not by his own power drive Enghmd from the seas, he 
resolved to make use of other nations as his tools for 
that purpose. He declared the British Isles in a state 
of blockade, (on paper), forbade all trade with the 
detested islanders, confiscated the property of British 
subjects wherever found, and prohibited all vessels of 
any nationality coming from England or her ports in 
any part of the world, from entering the harbors of 
France. This was called the " Continental System" 
and any nation that refused to act upon it became 
Napoleon's enemy. 

More fiorhtino' ao-ain, this time with the Russians. 
They defeated Napoleon at the battle of Eylau; but 
in a few months he brouo-ht two hundred thousand 
men to bear on the enemy, and at Friedland victory 
was again on his side. After this tlie Czar was quite 
ready to conclude a peace, and a meeting took place 
between them like those of an earlier century in the 
river Bidassoa. Exactly in the middle of the river Nie- 
mon, which in one place separates Russia from Prussia, 
a large raft was moored; on this a tent was erected, and 
in this tent the emperors met and embraced each other. 
" I hate the English as much as you do," were the 
first words of business spoken by the Czar. "In that 
case," answered Napoleon, "peace is made already." 
This peace is known to the world as the Treaty of 
Tilsit. By this it was arranged that the king of Prussia 



THE EMPIRE. 349 



should give up the western portion of his country, 
which was to be called the Kingdom ^f Westphalia 
and given to Napoleon's brother Jerome, and on the 
east, that part of Poland which had come to Prussia in 
the partition of 1772, was to bo handed over to the 
king of Saxony. The down trodden Poles, who had 
furnished Napoleon some fine troops, hoped through 
his means to recover their independence, and were 
bitterly disappointed at the result of the conference. 

The marvelous fortunes of Napoleon were at their 
height after the Peace of Tilsit. The people of France 
were in a state of delirious enthusiasm. He was to 
them more than a hero; he was a demigod. Language 
failed in attempting to express their idolatry, and 
some of the flatteries addressed to him recall to our 
minds the court of Queen Elizabeth. He repaid this 
devotion by a more than Tudor- like tyranny. The 
press was placed exclusively under his control, and 
nothing could be published which had not been first 
examined by his censors. To supply soldiers for his 
destructive campaigns, he resorted to a merciless con- 
scription, anticipating each year the legal age at which 
men could be drafted into the army, until towards the 
end of his career the regiments were made up largely 
of boys, of whom more died from fatigue and exhaus- 
tion than on the field of battle. 

Of all the aggressions of Napoleon, his conduct 
towards Spain and Portugal was perhaps the one most 
utterly without a shadow of justification. He had 
ordered the Re2:ent of Portuoral to arrest all the Brit- 
ish subjects in his dominions and confiscate all British 
property. The Regent, though he complied, showed 



350 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

some disinclination thus to outrngc a nation with 
which ho was at peace; upon which Napoleon declared 
that the House of Braoranza* had ceased to vaim^ 
in Europe, and sent General Junot there with thirty 
thousand men to make his statement good. He next 
induced the king of Spain to trust himself and his 
family on French soil, and when he had them safe at 
Ba3^onne, procured from them an act resigning all their 
rights into his hands, after v/hich his brother Joseph 
was promoted to fill the throne of Spain, the king- 
dom of Naples passing to Murat, who had married 
Caroline Bonaparte, Napoleon's sister. 

The subjects of the tw^o feeble kings thus driven 
from their dominions did not take matters so easily. 
Insurrections arose at once in Spain, and daily assassin- 
ations, not only of the French, but of Spaniards who 
favored them, showed how determined the natives 
were to resist foreio-n interference. One French ^en- 
eral was forced to surrender, with his army; another 
was beaten at the battle of Vimiera by the English 
commander Wellesley, (afterwards Duke of Welling- 
ton), and driven out of Portugal. Napoleon now 
crossed the Pyrenees in person, defeated the Spaniards 
in several battles, and replaced his brother Joseph on 
the tottering throne which was anything but a bed of 
roses to him. The battle of Corunna will always be 
remembered by Englishmen on account of the death 
of Sir John Moore, immortalized by the verses begin- 
ning, 

" Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note." 

* The name of the royal family of Portugal. 



THE EMPIRE, 351 



The English had the advantage, l)ut immediately after- 
wards embarked for home, leaving Spain to take care 
of itself for a time. They afterwards sent another 
army, and the Peninsular War continued for six years 
with varying success: the battles of Talavera, Albuera, 
Salamanca and Vittoria were gained by the English 
during this time, and in 1813 the French were driven 
out of the Peninsula altogether. 

King Joseph escaped with his life, though little 
mor»', and retired into the obscurity from which his 
brother had dragged him forth. He was himself of a 
mild disposition, (a fact which subjected him to bitter 
taunts from Napoleon), but the barbarities committed 
or permitted by the French Marshals during his short 
reign made the French name deservedly odious in the 
Peninsula. 

We must now go back to tlie wars with other 
nations, for the emperor's life was but one succession of 
contests. The Austrians took advantaore of his absence 
in. Spain to bring an enormous army into th^ field. ' 
Napoleon hurried back into his own country, crossed 
the Rhine, drove all before him, took sixty thousand 
prisoners and great quantities of artillery, and a second 
time entered Vienna as a conqueror. It w\is after 
thi.s, at the battle of Aspern, that he ordered his first 
retreat. Here forty thousand men were sacrificed 
without accomplishing anything on either side, and 
the fiery Marshal Lannes, one of Napoleon's greatest 
favorites, received his death- wound. It seemed as if 
the great soldier's enemies had begun to learn from 
him the art of war. 

In a few days the battle of Wagram, a brilliant 



352 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

victory for the French, terminated the struggle. The 
Emperor of Austria, hopeless of resisting what seemed 
to be his fate, signed a humiliating treaty of peace 
by which he gave up to Napoleon a vast extent of 
territory, a tribute in money, and his kingly dignity, 
for he promised adherence to the Continental System, 
and acknowledged each of the newly-created monarch- 
ies. 

We have seen the conqueror loading his own family 

with honors to which they had no claim; we have seen 
him place upon his wife's brow the coronet which 
made her a sharer in his intoxicating triumph; we 
have now to see how little real feelino; lurked under 
this apparent generosity, and how coolly the being who 
was dearest to him was sacrificed as soon as he thought 
that her place could be filled by one who would min- 
ister better to his ambition. The Empress Josephine 
had been to him the most tender and devoted wife. 
She had bestowed her hand upon him Avhen he was a 
poor young lieutenant, with nothing, as her friends 
said in trying to dissuade her from the marriage, but 
" his cloak and his sword," and she had presided over 
his court with a grace and sweetness which made up 
to some extent for his own insolent and discour- 
teous manners. But his heart was set on being the 
founder of a family Avhich should carry down his 
oTcatness to future generations, and Josephine had no 
children after her marriage with him. Napoleon, 
therefore, with profound selfishness and a perfect in- 
difference to the laws of God and man, determined to 
separate from her. The Senate and the Ecclesiastical 
Court of Paris, which were but the slaves of his will, 



THE EMPIRE. 353 



pronounced a decree of divorce, and the warm-hearted 
wife, whose affection for her husband continued throuixh 
both good and evil fortune, was sent to wear out her 
soul in sorrow at Malmaison, a beautiful country-place 
which Napoleon had given her in their happy days, 
and where she spent, in dignified retirement, the re- 
mainder of a chequered life. 

Hoping to purchase the friendship of the great 
powers of Europe by an alliance with one of them. 
Napoleon soon afterwards married Maria Louisa, 
daughter of the Emperor of Austria. A son, who was 
immediately proclaimed King of Rome, was born of 
this union; but apart from this it did not produce the 
hoped-for results. The proud sovereigns who were 
obliged to receive Napoleon as a political equal, liked 
him none the better for thus forcino; himself into 
their family circle; and in France the marriage was 
extremely unpopular. From this time we begin to 
see indications of his downfall; and the coincidence 
is too striking not to have furnished reasons to many 
observers for connecting his subsequent misfortunes 
with this abandonment of justice and honor. 

The Continental System soon gave excuse for more 
"annexing." As Pope Pius the Seventh declined to 
concur in it, or to recognize Murat as Kino* of Na- 
pies, the Papal States were declared annexed to the 
French Empire, though the Pope was graciously per- 
mitted to remain in the Vatican. Declining the 
friendship of France at the price of sul)mission, he 
excommunicated Napoleon and everybody who aided 
and abetted him. Upon this the aged pontiff was 
seized in his palace at midnight and carried off to 
23 



354 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

France, where he was detained, though treated with 
respect, for nearly five years. 

Louis Bonaparte, also, the King of Holland, refused 
to destroy th3 prosperity of his new subjects by 
sacrificing their commerce with England. Thereupon 
his affectionate brother sent Marshal Oudinot into 
Holland with twenty thousand men, to take possession 
of the country and annex it to France. Louis retired 
to Austria, and from that country issued a proclama- 
tion letting the world know very plainly what he 
thouo-ht of such efforts at universal dominion. 

o 

In still another quarter, the great dictator found his 
will resisted. The King of Sweden, having no children, 
had appointed as his heir Bernadotte, one of Napo- 
leon's marshals. This proved an excellent choice for 
Sweden, but was displeasing to Napoleon, who did 
not find his old companion-in-arms as docile as he 
could have wished. The Berlin decrees were, as 
usual, the occasion of strife. Bernadotte, a just and 
honorable man, was unwiilino: to enforce what was so 
manifestly unreasonable, and Swedish Pomerania, a 
province within the present territory of Prussia, be- 
came a depot for English merchandise. Early in the 
year 1812, a year memorable for its later events, a 
French army was sent, without any declaration of 
war, into Pomerania, and Berandotte appealed to 
Alexander of Russia for assistance. 

The Czar had long felt that it would be impossible 
for him to continue at peace with Napoleon, but hesi- 
tated to besrin a struo-o-le which must involve such 
momentous consequences. Napoleon did not wait for 
him, however. He put his army in motion and 



BUSSIAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 355 

proceeded to Dresden, where he was splendidly enter- 
tained by the king of Saxony, who had also the 
emperor and empress of Austria and the king of Prus- 
sia, besides lesser monarchs, for his guests. Surround- 
ed thus by crowned heads and by a brilliant circle 
of princes, dukes, marshals and nobility of various 
sorts. Napoleon passed several weeks at Dresden, 
awaiting the return of his envoy from Russia. On 
finding that the Czar would not come to terms, he ex- 
claimed with his usual hauo-htiness, " Russia is drasfffed 
on by a fate; let her destiny be accomplished! " If he 
could have looked a little farther into the book of 
Fate, he would have seen that it was not her destiny 
that was to be fulfilled, but his own. 



CHAPTEB XXXVIL 

PROM THE EXPEDITION TO RLTSSIA TO THE RETURN" 
FROM ELBA. 1812-1815. 

EVER in modern times has an army so enor- 
mous as that of Napoleon now was, moved at 
once in one direction. The most moderate 
accounts place its numbers at nearly half a million of 
men. Not all of this vast host were Frenchmen. 
Austrians and Prussians, Swiss and Italians, even 
recreant Spaniards and Portuguese, pressed forward, 
hoping to find victory and booty under the banners of 
France. The rendezvous was at Wilna in Poland, and 




356 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

many Poles eagerly seized the opportunity of attacking 
Russia, their enemy and oppressor, under the safe- 
guard of the conqueror's protection. As it was late in 
the summer before the immense force of all arras 
could be collected, it was proposed to postpone the 
advance until the following year, but Napoleon's long- 
ing for conquest would not allow him to wait. 
" Peace," he said, " awaits us under the walls of Mos- 
cow! " 

Towards Moscow, therefore, he set his face. The 
Russian policy was at first only to harrass his army 
by cutting off small bodies of men who were foraging 
for subsistence, and to turn the country into a desert 
by burning villages and towns, as well as all fruits of 
the harvest that lay in the' path of the invader. A 
battle, however, was hazarded at the village of Boro- 
dino, where there was a tremendous loss of life on 
both sides, and the Russian army under General 
Kutusoff was compelled to retreat, though not with- 
out giving the invaders a staggering blow. After this, 
Napoleon was allowed to pursue his way to Moscow, 
for the enemy well knew that his persistence would 
prove his destruction. The terrors of a Russian win- 
ter had not been counted on as among the obstacles to 
be met by the French. Being in. the midst of a hostile 
country, without food, and all comTiiunication with his 
own country having been cut off, it would be only 
necessary to leave the enemy to the forces of nature to 
insure his ruin. 

As the French army drew nearer, the Russians in 
Moscow quietly began to depart. The wealthier part 
of the population went first, carrying with them their 



RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 357 



valuables of every description; the middle classes fol- 
lowed; whatever could be taken in their hurried de- 
parture was removed, and when the Emperor entered 
the old capital there remained only empty houses 
and the lowest class of the population. Napoleon es- 
tablished himself in that part of the city called the 
Kremlin, in a magnificent palace which had been in- 
habited by Russian emperors up to the tinie of Peter 
the Great. On the same night a fire broke out in the 
city, and the soldiers, exhausted with fatigue as they 
were after their weary march, were roused from their 
sleep to quell it. After raging for several hours it 
was put down, but the next night flames burst forth in 
so many places at once as to show an intention to 
burn out the French as well as starve and freeze them 
out. This time the conflagration could not be con- 
trolled; a fierce wind fanned the flames, and a great 
part of the city lay in ruins. Napoleon now proposed 
negotiation, but General Kutusoff answered that no 
negotiation could be even begun while a single French 
soldier remained on Russian soil. Finding him firm 
in this determination, the invader prepared, with a 
heavy heart, to retreat. Marshal Mortier, who com- 
manded the rear-guard, was ordered to blow up the 
Kremlin. Fortunately for Moscow, the rapid return 
of the Russian army prevented this act of vandalism 
from being fully carried into efi'ect. 

The horrors of that homeward march one hardly 
dares to describe. The winter set in earlier than 
usual and with frightful severity. The soldiers died 
by thousands in the wild snow-storms which swept over 
the country, and many of those who lay down by their 



858 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

camp-fires at night were found cold and stiff in the 
morning. They were poorly fed, and the weakness 
arising from this increased their sensibility to cold. 
Almost all the horses died, and thousands of wagons, 
laden with provisions and with the spoils of Moscow, 
were abandoned on the road. One of the officers who 
accompanied Napoleon on that dreadful journey tells 
us that all along their line of march were little 
hillocks in the snow, which the next spring's thaw 
discovered to be caused by the bodies of French 
soldiers as they fell by twos and threes to rise no 
more. When the army reached the plain of Boro- 
dino they saw the remains of twenty thousand unburied 
corpses of their countrymen, partly devoured by beasts 
of prey. But they were obliged to hasten on, with 
only a passing glance of dismay. 

I quote Sir Walter Scott's description of a part of 
this march. " The stragglers, who now comprehended 
almost the whole army, divided into little bands, 
who assisted each other, and had sometimes the aid 
of a miserable horse, which, when it fell down 
under the burden of what they had piled on it, was torn 
to pieces and eaten, while life was yet palpitating in 
its veins. These bands had chiefs selected from 
amono- themselves. Those associated into such a 
fraternity would communicate to none save those of 
their own party, a mouthful of rye- dough, which, sea- 
soned with gunpowder for want of salt, and eaten 
with a bouille of horse-flesh, formed the best part of 
their food. Neither would they permit a stranger to 
warm himself at their fires, and when spoil was found, 
two of these companies often, especially if of differ- 



RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 359 

ent countries, fought for the possession of it; and a 
handful of meal was a sufficient temptation for putting 
to death the wretch who could not defend his booty." 
At the passage of the river Beresina a Russian force 
was waiting to intercept them. Napoleon • instantly 
had two bridges thrown across the river, over which the 
greater part of his army crossed without loss. Then 
the Russians suddenly attacked the remaining body, 
and to prevent the enemy from crossing the river one 
bridge was blown up, by order of the French general, 
while the other broke down under the wein-ht of the 

o 

artillery. A heart-rending scene followed. Thousands 
of the struggling troops were drowned in the icy 
waters; thousands more, driven back upon the Russian 
sabres, were slaughtered, and the remainder were 
taken prisoners. 

After all these vicissitudes, and many, many more, 
probably not more than one-tenth of the gallant men 
who set out with Napoleon from Wilna five months 
before, remained to cross the Niemen as a straggling 
mass of fugitives, without order or discipline, on their 
return. Their commander had already deserted them. 
Quitting the army in disguise, he went forward on 
sledges with three or four of his friends, as fast as 
horses could carry them, and traveling as secretly as 
possible, reached Paris only a few hours after his 
bulletin saying that all was lost had been published in 
the capital. 

It was not long before Napoleon was on his way to 
Prussia with another army, for the king of Prussia and 
the Czar had allied themselves too-ether to resist him, 
and France once more poured out her thousands, as she 



360 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



was persuaded, for her defence, not knowing that it 
was only that the Emperor might continue to be the 
autocrat of Europe. After the desperately-fought 
battles of Lutzen and Bautzen, in which a barren 
victory remained with the French, no trophies having 
been won, Austria, acting as a mediator, proposed 
terms of peace. These terms were that France should 
abandon the greater part of her conquests, which were 
to be restored to the rightful owners. This offer 
Napoleon indignantly refused, and the Emperor 
Francis announced his intention of joining himself to 
the opposite side. 

Three great nations were now in arms against 
France, besides the English, who, under Wellington, 
were gradually driving the French out of Spain. 

Napoleon had established his headquarters at Dres- 
den, in very different style from that of his visit there 
on his way to Russia, and it was near this city that a 
battle was fought extending over two days, which 
resulted in the defeat of the allies, who retreated in 
confusion. At the battle of Dresden the famous gen- 
eral Moreau, the victor of Hohenlinden, received his 
death-wound. Banished from France on suspicion of 
conspiring against Napoleon, who had alienated him 
by jealousy and unkindness, he had been persuaded 
to join the Allies, and perished in his first battle 
against the soldiers of his native land. 

We now come to the deadliest struggle of modern 
times, " the battle of the nations," fought at Leipsic. 
For three days rivers of blood were soured out; Rus- 
sian, Austrian, Prussian, Swedish troops succeeded 
each other in almost countless numbers; the armies 



RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 361 

of Saxony and Wurtemburg, which had enlisted under 
French banners, deserted to the enemy; Napoleon 
had no fresh levies to draw upon, while the allies were 
constantly reinforced, and on the morning of the 
fourth day he ordered a retreat. It is estimated that 
the number of troops engaged on both sides during 
these bloody days amounted to nearly four hundred 
thousand. The gallant Polish warrior, Poniatowski, 
whom the Emperor had recently made a marshal of 
France, died by drowning during the retreat. 

The retreat was a scene of wretched disorder. 
Great numbers of the troops perished from privation, 
and though Napoleon managed to win a battle on 
the way to Paris, his army was in a shattered condi- 
tion. Whenever he was not present, fortune seemed 
to desert the French standard. Tidings reached him 
from every quarter of surrendered garrisons, lost 
battles, forsaken conquests. The Confederation of 
the Rhine melted away. Hanover returned to Eng- 
land, Westphalia to Prussia, Holland to its lawful 
rulers; and the j'^ear which witnessed the battle of 
Leipsic and all these consequent disasters, also saw 
Joseph Bonaparte driven out of Spain, and the Duke 
of Wellington advancing on French soil as far as to 
the gates of Bayonne. 

Napoleon was now forced to make a- candid state- 
ment of his situation to the Senate and to ask for a 
fresh levy of men, which was granted; but where 
were the men to come from? The nation had been 
drained of them. He complained bitterly that they 
furnished him only boys, — " food for powder," he 
said, " fit to encumber the hospitals and die by the 



E62 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

roadside," — instead of vigorous troops. With their 
utmost exertions little more than an army of a hun- 
dred thousand men could be raised, while the allies 
proceeded to invade France itself, by three different 
roads, with not less than two hundred thousand. 

It was now no longer a strife for conquest; it was a 
struggle for existence. On quitting the Tuileries to 
take the field, Napoleon confided to the National 
Guard his wife and infant son, " all that was dearest to 
him in the world," he told them. Maria Louisa was 
named Regent, with Joseph Bonaparte, the ex-king of 
Spain, as her chief counsellor. The Allies proclaimed 
to the world that they fought, not against France, but 
against Napoleon. The stupendous military genius of 
the great conqueror never appeared greater than 
now with all the world in arras against him. His 
ceaseless activity, his wonderful plans and combina- 
tions, his forced marches so rapid as to seem almost 
impossible, continually surprising the enemy, all spoke 
the mighty genius — but his star was waning. The 
allied armies marched on Paris while he was defend- 
ing the frontiers, and after a heroic defence by Mar- 
shal Marmont the capital was forced to surrender. To 
have held out longer would have been only a willful 
sacrifice of life. The French troops were permitted to 
retire, and the Allies entered Paris in triumph amidst 
the silent wonder of the inhabitants, who had been 
deceived as to their real numbers. The people of 
Paris, always fickle and now thoroughly tired of Napo- 
leon's rule, shouted their hurrahs for the emperor of 
Russia, for the king of Prussia, for Louis the Eigh- 
teenth ; and the Senate proclaimed that Napoleon 



BUSS IAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 363 

Bonaparte, having violated the laws of France and 
the rights and liberties of the people, had forfeited the 
throne, and that the French nation and the army were 
released .from their engagements to him. Maria 
Louisa and the young King of Rome had retired from 
the city before the fighting began. 

Napoleon, hastening back as soon as he knew the 
enemy's movements, had advanced to within ten miles 
of Paris before he heard the news of the capitulation. 
It was a complete surprise to him, and at first he 
insisted on pressing on to the capital, feeling certain 
that his presence alone would turn the tide in his favor; 
but yielding to the advice of his friends he went to 
Fontainebleau, and thereafter a few days' delay signed 
an act of abdication by which he renounced for himself 
and his heirs all rights to the thrones of France and 
Italy. Ho took a most pathetic leave of his " Old 
Guard " in the court at Fontainebleau, (April 20th, 
1814), and then set out with an escort provided by the 
Allies, for the island of Elba, which had been assigned 
as his residence. 

Maria Louisa retired with her son to Vienna, where 
she could be under her father's protection. The 
Empress Josephine lived but a short time after Napo- 
leon's abdication, dying at Malmaison within six weeks 
after his departure. She was deeply lamented by the 
poor, to whom she had always been a kind friend; and 
her husband cherished her memory to his latest hour 
with probably the tenderest affection of which his 
self-centered soul was capable. 

On the same day that Napoleon quitted Fontaine- 
bleau, Louis the Eighteenth, (brother, as will be re- 



364 BISTORT OF FRANCE, 



membered, of Louis the Sixteenth, and uncle of the 
poor boy who was a victim to the Reign of Terror, 
and who would have become Louis the Seventeenth had 
he lived), set out from his country-house in England to 
take possession of the vacant throne of France. He 
was received by the Royalists with wild enthusiasm, 
but the mass of the people looked on in silence, 
scarcely knowing what to make of this sudden change 
of rulers. 

By the side of Louis as he rode through the streets 
sat his niece, Maria Theresa, the Duchess of Angou- 
leme, daughter of Louis the Sixteenth, who had shared 
her mother's imprisonment in the Temple, and had 
seen all her family, one after another, fall victims to 
the fury of the Revolution. Louis had promised to 
support a liberal constitution, not unlike that of 
Great Britain, and he no doubt intended, according to 
his understanding of the term, to rule well; but he 
was dull and self-indulgent, and quite willing to give 
the government into the hands of his brother, the 
Count d'Artois, a restless, intriguing person, who had 
the true Bourbon hatred of liberty, and tried to act as 
if there had been no Revolution. 

All the king's proclamations were dated in the nine- 
teenth year of his reign, as if everything that had hap- 
pened sin ce the death of poor little Louis the Seven- 
teenth, — the Directory, the Consulate, the Empire 
— were quite unworthy to be mentioned. The king ap- 
peared to forget that a great change had come over 
thie state of the people's minds since the days of his 
grandfather, Louis the Fifteenth, and still closed his 
decrees with the words " for such is our good pleasure," 



BUSSIAN CAMPAIGN. ELBA. 365 

and let hi^ subjects know very plainly that he consid- 
ered himself king by Divine Right and not by their 
will. Officers who had seen bloody service under 
Napoleon were displaced to make room for those who 
had never drawn sword for their country. Returned 
emigrants clamored for the restitution of their estates, 
and could not understand that the old order of things 
had been done away with. They, like the king and 
his brother, wanted to replace everything as it was in 
the year 1789. 

A treaty of peace was signed with the Allies, by 
which France was shorn of most of her Napoleonic 
conquests. Malta was given up to Great Britain, and 
Belgium and Holland were united under a native 
prince, who was to be called King of the Netherlands. 
A congress met afterwards at Vienna to discuss matters 
of general European interest, and it seemed as if a 
permanent peace would be the result of their negotia- 
tions, when they were suddenly aroused, in the begin- 
ning of March, 1815, by the news that Napoleon had 
escaped from Elba and landed in France, just about 
ten months after he had consented to leave it forever. 
When the excitement caused by such a thrill of sur- 
prise had subsided, the allied powers instantly agreed 
that Napoleon, having violated his plighted word and 
reappeared in France as a disturber of the peace of 
the world, must be considered as a public enemy; and 
three great armies, composed mainly of Russian, 
Austrian, Prussian and English troops, were set in 
motion without delay. 




366 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

THE HUNDRED DAYS TO THE REVOLUTION OP JULY, 

1815-1830. 

AVING collected an army of about a thou- 
sand men, the late Emperor of France landed 
on the French coast without opposition, and 
marched northward through a population seemingly- 
indifferent to his motions. Near Grenoble he found 
an armed force sent to oppose him under command of 
General Labeboyere. Leaving his own troops at a 
distance he walked up alone in front of the enemy, 
wearing the old gray great coat and the little cocked 
hat which all knew so well, and said in a loud voice, 
" Soldiers, if there is one among you who wishes to 
kill his general, he can do so; here 1 am!" With 
wild shouts of welcome the soldiers threw down their 
arms and joined him; their general followed their 
example, and from this time his march to Paris was a 
continued triumph. Marshal Ney, whom Napoleon 
had called " the bravest of the brave," had taken ser- 
vice under Louis, and being sent out to oppose his old 
general, boasted that he would " bring back the Cor- 
sican in an iron cage." But the sight of Napoleon 
re-awakened his old affection; he forgot his ncAvly 
taken oath, and went over to the Emperor with all his 
soldiers. In this way the army proceeded to Paris, 
growing as it went, and Louis the Eighteenth and his 
family sought refuge in the Netherlands. 



- TO THE REVOLUTION OF JULY, 1815-1830. 367 

The reception of Napoleon in the capitol was one 
of delirious rejoicings. People forgot his oppression, 
his cruel wars, his boundless ambition, and only re- 
membered how they hated the Bourbons. At the 
Tuileries he was literally carried np the grand stair- 
way in the arms of his adoring followers. He now 
labored night and day to raise an army to meet the in- 
vaders, and had he been allowed three months' time, 
it is probable that he might have brought hundreds 
of thousands of men into the field. But the near 
approach of the Allies decided him to attack them 
before they could all get together, so he collected 
what forces he could at once reach, and marched with 
a hundred and fifteen thousand men into Belgium, 
called " the battle-ground of Europe," from the many 
bloody contests which have taken place on its soil. 
There he found the EnMish under Welling^ton and the 
Prussians under Blucher in far greater numbers, with 
whom he fought the battles of Ligny, Quatre Bras and 
Waterloo, which ended his career as a soldier. 

There has been written more about the battle of 
Waterloo than about any other battle of ancient or 
modern times. The forces on each side were only about 
75,000 men, (until the arrival of some 30,000 Prussians 
near the close of the day), which is not one-third of 
the numbers that have fou2:ht in other battles; but it 
was the last struggle of the greatest soldier known to 
history; it was the turning point in the annals of 
France and of Europe; it was furiously fought, every 
man on both sides being engaged, and the losses 
were terrible; the victory was decisive and the de- 
feat overwhelming and irretrievable — so it is very 



368 HISTORY OF FRANCE 

generally thought the most important battle of the 
world. 

Napoleon's own estimate of men is said to have 
been " one Frenchman equals one Englishman, and 
each is equal to two men of any other nationality." 
It had strangely happened that he had never met the 
-English in the field since the siege of Toulon in his 
early years, the campaigns in Spain and Portugal 
having been carried on by his subordinates. The 
English had, on the 16th of June, a rather severe 
engagement at Quatre Bras with the French under 
Ney, and had fallen back on the 17th to the rear of a 
valley with gentle slopes near the village of Waterloo; 
where they took a position on one crest of the slope, 
having the valley and the opposite slope in their front, 
.and a forest in their rear through which led the road 
to the great city of Brussels, only a few miles away. 
Twelve miles off on their left was the Prussian army, 
under Blucher, on which Wellington depended to give 
him a superiority in numbers. 

The French, during the day and night of the 17th, 
had come up, following the English, and had taken 
their position on the opposite slope. There was a ter- 
rible storm of rain on the night of the 17th, which 
affected the French much more than the English, as 
the latter had got into position before it began, while 
the French were laboring through it all night, without 
sleep or rest. 

At about noon on June 18th the French are ready 
to attack, each army being ranged on its own hill-top 
in a " line of battle" about one-and-a-half miles lono-, 
and the battle begins. Not less than 500 cannon 



TO THE BEVOLUTION OF JULY, ISlh-lS^O. 069 

pour their shot and shell across the narrow valley. 
Napoleon knows that his whole future depends on his 
routing the enemy before the Prussians can arrive, so 
he sends his troops, veterans of a hundred battles, in 
charge after charge of desperate courage against the 
stern, immovable lines and squares of the English. 
Not a foot can the assailants srain which is not at once 
taken back from them. For five dreadful hours does 
this carnage continue, until the Duke of Wellington 
is observed to be looking anxiously at his watch and 
scanninof throuirh his orlass the direction throuo-h which 
the Prussians are expected. He is reported to have 
said aloud: " Oh for nijrht or Blucher! " 

At last the Prussians come. Near five o'clock a 
long dark line is visible far away to the left, and a few 
cannon shots are heard. Napoleon sees and hears 
them too. Then massing his " Old Guard," which has 
been held in reserve for just such a supreme moment, 
he orders them to charge, himself riding down the 
road where they pass, to let them see him once more 
and feel again the inspiration of his presence — and 
they are gone. In two great columns they march for- 
ward with shouts of defiance. 

It is their last dying effort. The Engb'sh pour in a 
crushing fire of musketry and artillery, and the ad- 
vancing columns wither away — falter — fall into con- 
fusion — halt — finallv retreat in disorder — and the 
great drama of Napoleon Bonaparte's career comes to 
an end. His "Star of Destiny" has set in blood. 

The Eno-lish at once advance from all sides, across 
the valley; but the pursuit is left to the fresher troops 
under Blucher, who give the French no rest until the 
24 



370 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

whole force is killed, wounded, made prisoners or 
dispersed. More than 150 cannon are taken by the 
English, and an equal number by the Prussians, with 
munitions of war and prisoners innumerable. 

Napoleon witnessed with dismay the flight of the 
Old Guard. "All is lost!" he exclaimed, and putting 
spurs to his horse rode away from the field at full 
gallop. He was the first to carry the news of his own 
defeat to the capital, leaving Marshal Soult to bring 
together, if possible, the scattered fragments of his 
army. 

AVhen it was known in Paris that he had lost a 
great battle and had returned alone to Paris, the 
funds, which he used to call "the thermometer of 
public opinion," strange to, say, rose at once. The 
feeling was inevitable that tranquility could be restored 
only by his downfall. " I see but one man between 
us and peace," said Lafayette addressing the Legisla- 
tive Chamber. These latter signified to Napoleon 
that there was no alternative but abdication. The ex- 
emperor, after a declaration that he offered himself as 
a sacrifice to the enemies of France, and that he 
abdicated in favor of his son, went to Rochefort on 
the coast, meaning there to embark for the United 
States. But the British were on the watch and refused 
to let him pass. He then Avent voluntarily on board 
the English ship Bellerophon, saying that he had come 
to throw himself upon the hospitality of the British 
joeople, and claim the protection of their laws. 

The British government, not thinking it safe to leave 
him at liberty after his breach of faith in Gsca|:^ing 
from Elba and again plunging Europe in a sea of 



TO THE REVOLUTION OF JULY, 1815-1830. 371 

blood, sent him as a prisoner of war to the lonely 
island of St. Helena, where he wore out six years of 
life in a vain struggle against the harshness and sever- 
ity of his jailers, who did not treat him with the mag- 
nanimity which, when they had him completely in 
their power, they might safely have exercised. He 
died in 1821, and his son, the so-called King of Rome, 
continued to live in great seclusion at Vienna until 
his death in 1832. 

A second time were the Bourbons forced upon the 
French people by foreign bayonets, and this time the 
conditions were hard indeed. France was sentenced 
to pay an enormous sum to the allies for the expenses 
of the war, to keep in pay for five years an army of a 
hundred and fifty thousand foreigners on her borders, 
and to give up a considerable territory on the eastern 
frontier. She was also required to restore all the works 
of art taken by Napoleon from conquered cities, which, 
though an act of simple justice, was felt as a severe 
humiliation. Having been so long accustomed to look 
upon the spoils of Rome, of Florence, of Vienna and 
Dresden as their own, they took pride in them as 
national possessions and bitterly resented their re- 
moval. 

Marshal Ney and General Lab^doyere, who had de- 
serted to Napoleon with the troops under their charge, 
were tried and shot for treason. Murat, the brother- 
in-law of the Emperor, perished in a senseless attempt 
to recover the kingdom of Naples, of which the lawful 
sovereign had again taken possession. He landed 
there with about thirty followers, was taken, tried by 
a court-martial and shot. The brothers of Napoleon 



372 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

and many of his generals retired to private stations, 
and after some popular tumults, affairs in France be- 
came tranquil, and remained so until the death of 
Louis the Eighteenth, which occurred in ,1824. He 
left no children, and his brother, the Count d'Artois, 
succeeded to the throne under the name of Charles 
the Tenth. 

It has been said of the Bourbons that " they never 
learned anything and never forgot anj'thing." The 
new king proved no exception. He carried matters 
with a high hand, announced the old doctrine of gov- 
ernment by absolute right, and resisted to the extent 
of his power all the efforts of the liberal party, which 
was becoming year by year stronger in France, to force 
him to rule according to the constitution. One of the 
last public acts of Louis the Eighteenth had been to 
help the Bourbon sovereigns of Spain and Naples to 
put down the rebellions which their atrocious tyranny 
had called forth; and his brother seemed determined 
to carry out in France the principles which had 
triumphed in these countries. 

Little of outside interest occurred in this reign. 
After helping the Greeks in their successful struggle 
against the Turks, who were finally overthrown in 
1827 at the battle of Navarino, a squadron was sent to 
Algiers to demand reparation for injuries done to the 
French consul and others in that city. A battle was 
fought in which the Algerines were defeated by Mar- 
shal Bourmont, and the Dey abandoned his country, 
which has since remained a province of France under 
the name of Algeria. 

It was hoped by the home government that this 



TO THE REVOLUTION OF JULY, 1815-1830. 373 

brilliant conquest would calm the excitement which 
filled the country at the despotic measures of Charles 
the Tenth, but the irritation continued to increase and 
was fed by the obstinacy of the king, who defied the 
wishes of the people by arbitrary enactments which 
constantly widened the breach between them. When 
remonstrated with he would say, " Louis the Sixteenth 
lost his throne by concessions. He was led to the scaf- 
fold for having yielded." Accordingly, Charles would 
yield nothing, but on the contrarx^^, dismissed the 
Cabinet officers who were poi3ular with the people, and 
appointed others known only for their blind devotion to 
the old system. As if to leave nothing undone which 
could insure the loss of his crown, he issued decrees 
suppressing the liberty of the press, dissolving the 
newly elected legislature before it had met, and mak- 
ing arbitrary changes in the system of election, with 
a view to bringing the nation more completely into 
subjection. A revolt which turned out to be a revolu- 
tion was the immediate consequence of these suicidal 
actions. In the "three days of July," 1830, the 
people once more arose against the exercise of illegal 
power. Barricades were erected in the streets; the 
tri-colored flag was displayed on the public buildings; 
" the population was transformed into an army and 
every house became a fortress." The venerable La 
Fayette was called from his retirement to take com- 
mand of the National Guard. Marshal Marraont, the 
commander of the royal forces, had urged the king to 
pacify the people by yielding while there was yet time, 
but received no answer except an order to suppress the 
rebellion by force of arms. The soldiers, obliged to 



374 HISTORF OF FRANCE. 



fight in narrow streets, were almost at the mercy of 
the populace, who shot at them from windows, walls 
and housetops, and finally compelled them to retreat. 
The mob then broke into the Tuileries palace and 
sacked it. The costly furniture was hacked to pieces 
and thrown into the Seine, and the victory was cele- 
brated with frantic demonstrations of joy. The king 
now offered to make concessions, but it was too late. 
Nothinor was left for him but flight. 

The memorable " three days " were the 27th, 28th, 
and 29th of July, and within two days afterward Charles 
removed from his palace of St. Cloud and prepared to 
leave the country. He now hoped that though he re- 
nounced the crown for himself it might still be worn 
by a member of his family. The people of France, 
however, preferred to pass over the elder branch of the 
Capetians, and offered the crown to Louis Philippe, 
son of the too famous " Philippe Egalite " of the Revo- 
lution. The offer was accepted, and Louis Philippe 
ascended the throne as " King of the French " — not 
king of France, which would have implied rather a 
hereditary right, than a choice by the people. The 
Duke of Bordeaux, grandson of Charles the Tenth, 
is still (1878) living in Europe under the title of 
Comte de Chambord, and would, if restored to the 
throne, be called Henry the Fifth. 




LOUIS PHILIPPE. 375 

CHAPTER XXXIX, 

LOUIS PHILIPPE. — 1830-]848. 

HE career of the King* of the French had 
been as varied as that of a hero of romance. 
Born in a palace, he began at the age of 
twenty years a life of exile which endured for as 
many more, and was often hard pressed to find means 
to buy the necessaries of life. In Switzerland he 
taught a village school; in the United States he gave 
lessons in the French language, preserving his self- 
respect by providing for his own needs. 

When at the restoration of the Bourbons the wan- 
derer returned to France, he found himself possessed 
of a princely fortune, but looked upon coldly by his 
royal relatives for the very reason which afterwards 
made his restoration under the name of " citizen - 
king" so popular with the masses; he had fought 
bravely under Kellerman and Dumouriez against the 
enemies of the Republic, and steadily refused to join 
the army of emigrants collected for the invasion of 
France. When, therefore, he told his people that the 
charter would now be a reality, a constitutional mon- 
archy, — that golden mean between despotism and 
anarchy, — seemed to have been reached. " Here," said 
La Fayette as he presented him to the people, " is 
the best of republics." How far such hopes were 
realized will appear later in our history. 

Peace with foreign nations was the policy of the 



378 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

new government, and was faithfully adhered to as far 
as possible. The inhabitants of Belgium, which had 
in 1815 been annexed to Holland, threw oif their al- 
legiance to the latter country and offered the crown to 
a son of Louis Philippe; but the king with great good 
sense declined the tempting bait, knowing that to 
swallow it would bring on a European war. Prince 
Leopold of Saxe Coburg was chosen, and, marrying 
the eldest daughter of the King of the French, joined 
the two countries in a union of interest. Louis Phil- 
ippe was an excellent man of business, clear-headed, 
calculating, economical; his private character was un- 
blemished and his intentions undoubtedly good; but he 
was tinged with the prevailing vice of the Bourbons, 
a love of power, which developed itself more strongly 
as he grew older. No doubt he had a difficult position 
to maintain. On the one hand were the Republicans, 
disapproving of a king of any kind; on the other the 
Legitimists, who wished to place on the throne the 
grandson of Charles the Tenth rather than the remote 
cousin who must go back to Louis the Thirteenth for 
his claim. A third class, which should not be con^ 
founded with those who were Republicans on principle, 
was composed of the idle and vicious of all ranks, who 
clamored for "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity," with 
very little idea of the meaning of their demands ex- 
cept the general notion that the rich ought to be made, 
somehow or other, to support the f)oor. 

With so many contradictory elements, it is not 
strange that disturbances arose in various parts of the 
country, which, being put down by force, made the 
king very unpopular. No fewer than seven attempts 



LOUIS PHILIPPE. 377 

against his life were made in the course of a few 
years. The principal one among these was the work 
of an Italian named Fieschi, who contrived an " infer- 
nal machine" which was to blow up Louis Philippe as 
he was riding in a procession to commemorate the 
Revolution of July. The king was not hurt, but 
many persons were killed or wounded. Among those 
killed was Marshal Mortier, one of Napoleon's old 
generals. 

In the year following this attempt (1836) Louis 
Napoleon Bonaparte, son of the Emperor's brother 
Louis and of Hortense de Beauharnais, suddenly ap- 
peared at Strasburg dressed in the costume of an officer 
of artillery, and called upon the garrison to join him in 
an attempt to gain his uncle's throne. Some enthusiasm 
was shown, but the troops remained true to their colors, 
and M. Bonaparte was arrested. The king, however, 
declined to prosecute him, and he came to this country, 
where he spent some years in the neighborhood of New 
York. In 1840 he again attempted to overturn the 
government of Louis Philippe, carrying with him into 
France a tame eagle, which was expected to make a 
sort of rallying-point for the disaffected. But the 
eagle proved less attractive than had been expected, 
and was confiscated for the Zoological gardens, while 
its owner was arrested and imprisoned in the chateau 
of Ham. There he remained for six years, and then 
made his escape disguised as a workman, taking refuge 
in England, to re-appear before long in France under 
another character. 

During the first ten years of Louis Philippe's reign, 
France was at peace with all the outside world except 



37S HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

the uuconqusred tribes of Algeria. In 1840 the 
British government consented to the removal of the 
remains of Napoleon from St. Helena to Paris, in ac- 
cordance with one of the last wishes expressed by him. 
Three of the faithful friends who had shared his exile 
were present at the disinterment, and found the features 
still perfect after nineteen years. The arrival of the 
funeral cortege in Paris and the re-interment of the 
coffin in the vault of the Hotel des Invalides was a 
scene never to be forgotten. 

Notwithstanding this act of courtesy on the part of 
England, she still kept a jealous eye on the movements 
of France, and stood ready to resist any attempt at 
aggression. She did not like the occupation by the 
French of the Society Islands in the Pacific, nor the 
marriage of the Duke of Montpensier, one of Louis 
Philippe's sons, with the sister of the queen of Spain, 
thus rendering possible once more the union of the 
two crowns in one person, and she was anxious lest 
the Algerian conquest should extend far enough to 
threaten Gibraltar; but no actual hostilities resulted 
from this displeasure. The king, however, took advan- 
tage of the circumstance to surround Paris with exten- 
sive fortifications, which caused loud murmurs amona: 
the people, who feared that this might be made a means 
of interfering with their liberties. 

The death in 1842 of the Duke of Orleans, oldest 
son of Louis Philippe, who was killed by being 
thrown from his carriage, was a source of deep grief 
to the French nation, as well as to his family, as he 
was a man of admirable qualities. He left two sons, 
the Comte de Paris, now the representative of the 



..A 



LOUIS PHILIPPE. 379 

royal family of Bourbon -Orleans, and the Duke de 
Chartres. Both these princes came to America and 
helped the Union cause in the great Rebellion, and 
the Comte de Paris has since written an excellent his- 
tory of the struggle, a fact which speaks well for the 
practical ability of this scion of a royal race. 

In Algeria, a protracted strife between the native 
tribes and the conquerors had been going on since 
the first occupation of the country by the French, and 
many of the best troops of France were sacrificed to 
the unhealthy climate and in the bloody combatF. 
The Arab chieftain, Abdel-Kader, a man whose mili- 
tary genius and indomitable courage would have made 
him rank high among the warriors of any nation, held 
out with the greatest obstinacy, but was at last taken 
prisoner and carried to France, where he was kept in 
confinement for six years. The Algerine war is com- 
puted to have cost France, up to the time of his cap- 
ture in 1847, a thousand millions of francs, and the 
lives of three hundred thousand men. 

Many causes of discontent had arisen during the 
reign of Louis Phillippe, which were artfully increased 
by a class of agitators called Socialists, who had noth- 
ing to lose and everything to gain by disorder and 
civil strife. A failure in the harvest raised the price 
of provisions, and the same cause made work scarce 
and w^aj^es low. All this was laid to the account of 
the government, and as some arbitrary measures gave 
just offence to the people, the demand for " Reform " 
was made to cover the whole ground, and the censor- 
ship of the press ingeniously manipulated so as to be 
held responsible for the bad crops. 



380 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

The agitators held a series of " Reform banquets " 
in the different cities, and one was appointed to take 
place in Paris on the 22d of February, 1848. This 
was forbidden by the authorities, upon v^'hich a popu- 
lar tumult arose, in which the King and his ministers 
showed so little firmness or good sense that the end 
was an entire overthrow of the government. Though 
Louis Philippe had the best minds in the kingdom to 
assist him, such men as Thiers and Guizot forming 
part of his council, no one among them had the ability 
to conquer a revolution. The National Guard, seeing 
the vacillation of their rulers, sided with the rioters; 
the king fled after vainly trying to secure the crown 
to his grandson the Comte de Paris, and a republic 
was proclaimed amid general confusion. Louis Phil- 
ippe, with his family, went to England, where he died 
two years afterward. 

For some days it seemed uncertain whether the new 
Revolution would not repeat the scenes of 1789. 
Paris was ruled by an armed mob, who clamored for 
immediate relief of their needs, but opposed every 
movement which proposed to establish a settled gov- 
ernment. M. de Lamartine, a celebrated French 
author, was placed temporarily at the head of affairs, 
and showed sfreat wisdom and firmness. 

Among the measures insisted on by the populace 
was the establishment of national workshops, where the 
idle poor could find employment. After a little trial 
this experiment was shown to be ruinous to the State, 
and useless for the workmen, who squandered in dissi- 
pation the money thus paid them; but as was to be 
expected, the attempt to discontinue them was 



LOUIS PHILIPPE. 381 

attended with frinbtful carnaije. Barricades were 
raised instantly in the streets, and before order could 
be restored, thousands of lives had been sacrificed. 
General Cavaiornac was made military dictator, and 
put down the riots with a decision which, had it been 
displayed by the Royalists at the first outbreak, would 
have left the kino; on his throne. Amono: the victims 
of this sanguinary contest was the venerable Arch- 
bishop of Paris, who lost his life by a random shot 
while he was trying to mediate between the soldiers 
and the mob. 

The republic being established, a president was to 
be chosen. There were two candidates — General 
Cavaignac, who had saved the city, and Louis Napo- 
leon Bonaparte, the hero of Strasburg and Ham. The 
magic of a name decided the fickle public in favor of 
the latter; he was elected for a term of four years by 
an immense majority, and entered upon the duties of 
his office in December, 1848. 

1848 has been called " The year of Revolutions." 
The disturbances in France sent an electric thrill over 
the continent, almost every country not governed by 
an autocrat feeling it more or less. In Italy, espe- 
cially, there were convulsive eflforts to throw off 
the Austrian dominion in the north, and the Pope was 
so much alarmed by the condition of afi*airs in Rome 
that he fled from the city, and a republican govern- 
ment was proclaimed there. General Garibaldi taking 
command of the revolutionary troops. Pius the Ninth 
now called upon France to interpose in his behalf, and 
by the help of French bayonets the insurrection was 
quelled and the pontiff" replaced on his throne. 



382 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

It soon became evident to the world at larjre that the 
nephew of Napoleon the First was preparing to re- 
enact some scenes of the great drama played by his 
distinguished uncle. On the second of December, 
1851, one of those coups d'etat took place for which 
France has become so famous. It was much like the 
Revolution of the 18th Brumaire. The President of 
the French Republic in one night overthrew the gov- 
ernment, dissolving the Assembly by his own decree 
and appointing a ministry responsible only to him- 
self. Soldiers were at hand to quell every disturbance; 
as soon as possible the people vfere appealed to, and 
the votes of an enormous majority of them elected 
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte President for ten years 
with the powers of a dictator. Parliamentary govern- 
ment had not worked well in France. It had produced 
only civil commotion and a restless, ever-varying 
policy which is in some respects harder to live under 
than a despotism. The French people were so tired 
of it that they saw the change almost with indifference, 
and were, as a whole, neither very much surprised nor 
affected when in a year after the first coup d'etat the 
President was proclaimed Emperor of France under 
the name of Napoleon the Third, the shadowy form 
of the little King of Rome, which faded out of French 
history with his father's defeat at WaterloOj doing 
duty as Napoleon the Second. 



THE SECOND EMPIRE. 383 

CHAPTER XL. 

THE SECOND EMPIRE. 1852-1870. 




FAVORITE saying of the new Emperor was 
•' the Empire is Peace," and for the first few 
years of his reign his subjects acknowledged 
with gratitude that to them his rule meant not only peace 
but prosperity. There had been an element of the 
ridiculous in his first attempts to occupy the place of 
the great Napoleon, but once seated in that place, his 
talent for governing could not be questioned. Grand 
public improvements, perfect security, ever-increasing 
wealth, in spite of the taxes necessary to support an 
army supposed to be the finest in Europe, and a navy 
only excelled by that of England, — all these made the 
mass of the population thoroughly contented, and no 
more secret grumbling went on than is inevitable even 
in the best of governments. 

In 1853 Napoleon married Eugenie de Montijo, a 
Spanish lady of great beauty and noble family. For 
years she and her court set the fashions for all the 
world. Their only child, a son, was born in 1856. 

The first war undertaken by Napoleon was an attempt 
to preserve the " balance of power '* in which the great 
nations of Europe imagined their own safety to con- 
sist. Here a strange scene becomes visible. We 
have been looking at a thousand years' history of 
France, always with a side-glance at England, her 
great Island neighbor and hereditary foe, and behold, 



384 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

for almost the first time we see them as allies, fighting 
side by side against a common enemy. Russia had, for 
centuries, looked upon Constantinople with covetous 
eyes, and in 1854 she seemed about to crush Turkey to 
seize the great prize. But England, for the sake of her 
interests in India, and France, perhaps with the hope 
of regaining the political position lost by the treaties 
of 1815, thought it proper to defend the Sultan. The 
king of Sardinia joined them on general principles, 
desirinof to have his little state recoo-nized as a member 
of the grea,t European family — (it has since grown 
into the kingdom of Italy) — and the three powers 
united with the Turks in an attack on the great Rus- 
sian naval station of Sebastopol, the chief city in the 
Crimea. On the way there the battle of the Alma 
was fought and won by the Allies, and then the place 
was besieo-ed in due form. 

This siege of eleven months is the most famous in 
history. All possible modern inventions of warfare 
were employed on both sides. It was shown that 
stone walls are not the best defence against great 
artillery, avid that nothing but earthworks can be 
relied upon. The whole Russian Black Sea fleet was 
sunk in Sebastopol harbor to keep it from falling 
into the enemy's hands. The losses on all sides were 
grievous, and in modern times deaths in the field are 
more severely felt than of old, on account of the rapid 
spread of news by means of telegraphs and newspapers, 
and the sympathy thus awakened with the individual 
friends of those who die. Mourning was the fashion- 
able wear in Paris, London and St. Petersburg. The 
battle of Balaklava, otherwise unimportant, is made 



THE SECOND EMPIRE. 3<95 

memorable by a useless onslaught, (made through 
mistaken orders, by the choicest cavalry of the British 
array), called " the charge of the Six Hundred," wherein 
a very large number of the charging party were killed, 
and desolation carried into almost every circle of the 
upper classes in England. The chief battle of the war 
waslnkermann, where the Russians attacked the allies 
and were driven back with great loss, but no decisive 
results. 

Tlie largest proportion of the losses was caused by 
disease and the exposure of troops poorly prepared for 
a rigorous winter. A terrible outcry was raised at 
home against this sacrifice of life, occurring where the 
unstinted outlay of money ought to have guarded 
against such things. But in this matter the French 
were found to have a far better system than the 
English; and after the war was over it was generally 
acknowledged that the former had reaped much more 
than the latter of the glory of military success. 

In spite of opposition, obstacles, disease and slaugh- 
ter, the. French and English pushed forward their earth- 
works against the outlying forts of the Russians until 
there were only a few yards of scored and scourged 
ground between them; and then one fine day a few 
picked regiments of the French army rushed across 
this space and took by storm the chief Russian strong- 
hold, the " MalakofT," in a bloody hand-to-hand fight, 
and held it. This made the other works untenable, 
and later the English seized the next strongest work, 
the " Redan," and Sebastapol was theirs. 

The city lay in ruins at the feet of the con- 
querors, who blew up such forts and docks as the cannon 
25 



886 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



had spared, and required of the Czar a promise not 
to rebuild the defences. Russia's aggressions were 
stopped for the time, and she was forbidden to have 
ships of war on the Black Sea; but France gained little 
benefit from this in comparison with her vast sacrifices. 

Three years later,' Napoleon again interfered in be- 
half of a brother soverei^-n. Victor Emanuel, kinjy of 
Sardinia, who had helped in the war of the Crimea, 
was invaded in his turn by Austria, and the French 
Emperor marched at once to his assistance. The 
names of Montebello, Magenta and Solferino recall to 
the minds of those of us who have lived throug-h these 
stirring events the victories by which the third Napo- 
leon signalized his march in Italy. 

At the Peace of Villafranca, which ended the 
war, (1859,) Lombardy, which had been under Aus- 
trian rule, was added to Sardinia on the east, while 
*the provinces of Nice and Savoy on the west were 
given up to France. The Emperor had not lent his 
support for nothing. This result was not at all what 
the Italians had expected when he promised them 
that " Italy should be free from the Alps to the Adria- 
tic," but fortunately for them they had those within 
their own boundaries who could dispense with foreign 
aid, and with Victor Emanuel II. for a king and 
Garibaldi for a general, a united Italy is now the 
result of their long struggle for unity and independ- 
ence. 

Yet once again did Napoleon find an excuse for in- 
terfering in the affairs of other nations. In 1862 he 
sent an expedition to Mexico, professedly to demand 
redress for injuries suff'ered by French residents there. 



THi: SECOND EMPIRE. 387 

Having after much flp^hting taken possession of the 
capita], the French general in command obtained a 
declaration from a part of the citizens that they desired 
an empire and would welcome a foreign ruler. Under 
the delusion that this was the feeling of the whole 
country, the Archduke Maximilian, brother of the Em- 
peror of Austria, accepted the invitation tendered him 
to mount the throne of the Montezumas. A bitter 
awakening was in store for him. The Republicans were 
still the strongest party in Mexico; the French troops 
which should have protected him were withdrawn 
from the country, and the unfortunate young man, 
deserted by those who had lured him on, fell a sacrifice 
to the vengeance of the Mexicans and was shot as a 
usurper in 1867. 

To a superficial view France was now at the height 
of prosperity, but the more acute observers saw under 
this the tokens of decay. The enormous sums spent 
by the Emperor on the improvement of Paris had 
brought an increase of taxes which were felt to be 
burdensome; his government was of the most arbi- 
trary pattern ; the free expression of opinion was not 
tolerated, and the garrison which had been kept in 
Rome since 1849 to support the temporal power of the 
Pope and keep out Victor Emanuel, offended many of ■ 
the liberal party. Still, Napoleon might have ended 
his days in his own capital but for his rushing, unpre- 
pared, into a causeless war which ended by driving 
him from his throne and his country. i 

The student of history observes that for centu- 
ries no nation had been able to make, single-handed, 
much headway against France in arms; she had been 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



the chief military power of the world. But after 
Waterloo, another began to come to the front. The 
history of Prussia during the years following her 
humiliations at the beginning of this century, shows 
that for nations as for individuals, misfortune is a 
good school. The government of Prussia was severe, 
industrious, economical, intelligent; and in two wars, 
the first against Denmark and the second against 
Austria, she had consolidated under her rule the 
greater part of the kingdoms, princedoms and duke- 
doms of Germany. Doubtless one bond of union 
among these diverse nationalities was a burning de- 
sire to wipe out the stains of the insults heaped upon 
all of them by the French under Napoleon. 

No barn-yard can maintain two champions; neither 
can a community of military nations. It became 
more and more evident that France and Prussia, each 
striving to outgrow the other in warlike power, must 
at some near day find an excuse to come to blows. 
The quarrel was begun by France on a pretext so 
slisrht that one can but feel that so far as ao-o^ression 
merits retribution, her speedy defeat was mere jus- 
tice. Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern, a protege of 
Prussia, chanced to be named for the succession to 
the crown of Spain. France protested, and Leopold 
withdrew; but when the French emperor demanded 
of Prussia a promise never again to support a similar 
claimant from any German State, King William very 
naturally refused the pledge, and Napoleon at once 
declared war. 

The emperor and the French people honestly 
thought that their army at this time was the most 



THE SECOND EMPIRE. 389 

perfect in every way that could be conceived of by the 
mind of man. No money had been spared on its 
preparation. The Minister of War announced that all 
was ready. It was popularly said in Paris that " not 
so much as a shoe-buckle would be required for a year." 
Very probably no shoe-buckles would be required, 
as those are things an army can very well do without; 
but everything an army can riot do without, was in 
fact wofully deficient. Maps, for instance, which are 
the first requisite for intelligent and rapid army move- 
ments, were utterly wanting. Perhaps they had maps 
of the roads in Germany, where they expected to do 
their fighting; but it chanced unfortunately for them 
that they had to fight in their own country, and of 
France, the Germans had much better maps than they 
had. The stores and supplies supposed to be on hand 
either did not exist or were never available at the 
time and place where they were wanted. 

Lauo-hable stories are told of the absurdities of " red 
tape " — complications of official system — in the French 
War Department. It is said that a certain mass of 
army wagons, taken to pieces and stored by thou- 
sands in an enclosure, would take two years to unpack, 
extricate, put together and set in motion. This is of 
course an exao-jreration, but it illustrates the kind of 
faults into which years of peace and of unwise admin- 
istration had broujrht the once active French army. 

Even the numbers counted on were not there. 
But some 240,000 men were on hand, which was more 
than could be used. This confused mass, miscalled an 
army, was hurled rapidly toward the frontier of Ger- 
many, hoping to find the enemy unprepared. But the 



390 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

German army was as perfectly ready for war when it 
left its cantonments, as a machine is ready for work 
when it leaves the workshop. For an army drilled 
and exercised as the German army now is, a campaign 
is merely a kind of excursion for putting in practice 
the principles which have been studied through years 
of schooling'. There is a storv that a Prussian officer, 
after the war, said to his soldiers, " Now the pastime 
of war is over, we will return to the serious business 
of life, which is drilling." 

The first collision was a skirmish which occurred at 
Saarbrlick, which the French tried to magnify into a 
victory. x\fter this followed a series of struggles 
scarcely to be dignified with the name of battles, so 
utterly powerless were the ill-ordered, badly officered, 
disorganized, outgeneraled forces of France against 
the fierce and steady Germans. W5rth, Gravelotte and 
Sedan were the chief scenes of defeat. At Sedan the 
French Emperor was taken prisoner, with his army 
of eighty thousand men. The news of this roused 
the excitable Parisians to fury, and the whole blame 
of the reverses was thrown upon Napoleon. The 
Empire was declared at an end as suddenly as it had 
been called into existence; a republic, with General 
Trochu at its head, was hastily proclaimed by a small 
knot of politicians, and the Empress, who had been 
left in Paris as Regent, was glad to get away safely 
from the city. The Germans connived at the escape 
of her husband after the victory of Sedan, and the 
imperial family fled to England, where the Emperor 
has since died, leaving a son, who, we may suppose, 
hopes one day to rule France as Napoleon the Fourth. 



THE THIIiD REPUBLIC. 391 



THE TIIIED RErUBLIC. 

The main interest of the war was now centered in 
the sieges of three strongly fortified towns — Strasburg, 
Metz and Paris. Strasburg was taken after a short 
but severe bombardment, which inflicted irreparable 
'injury on the beautiful city, and Metz was given up a 
few weeks later by Marshal Bazaine, with 173,000 
men; but Paris, with its magnificent system of de- 
fences, was enabled to stand a siege of more than 
four months. Durino* this time much sufferino- was 
sustained by the inhabitants, though it is doubtful 
whether there were any deaths by actual starvation. 
The beleao'uered Parisians communicated with the 
outside world by means of balloons, which, rising from 
inside the walls, sailed away high over the heads of 
the Germans, and, though sometimes taken, more often 
reached some friendly neighborhood safely. M. Gam- 
betta, the minister of war, escaped in one of these, 
and endeavored to reinforce the outside armies. 
Trained carrier-pigeons flew back and forth, conveying 
rolls of tissue-paper on which thousands of words 
were photographed; but though these devices kept up 
hopes of relief, they did not bring bread, and the city 
at length surrendered to the besiegers. 

King William of Prussia, who had been living in 
the palace at Versailles during the siege, marched 
with a part of his army under the Arc de Triomplie 
and to the Place de La Concorde, in token of victory, 
but did not remain in the city. Perfect order was 
maintained by the Germans, and, as to the French, 
they left the streets deserted and the houses closed, to 



392 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

indicate that though the city was conquered, the citi- 
zens were still their own masters. The terms of peace 
exacted by Prussia were not severe, considering the 
magnitude of her successes. The principal condi- 
tions were the cession of Alsace and a part of Lor- 
raine, (both of which had once belonged to Germany), 
and the payment of an indemnity amounting to about 
a thousand millions of dollars. 

As soon as the invadincr force had beg-un to with- 
draw, the provisional government established itself at 
Versailles, wisely declining to entrust itself to the 
tender mercies of the turbulent Parisians. This cau- 
tion, and other acts indicating a steady purpose of 
maintaining law and order, so incensed the old revo- 
lutionary spirit always seething in the lower classes of 
Paris, that they rose against the republican authority, 
defied it, shut the gates of the city against it and 
established a government of their own called the 
Commune, the success of which would probably have 
produced excesses similar to those of the first Revolu- 
tion and the Reio-n of Terror. 

The Versailles government, with all the better 
republicans of France on its side, now attacked the 
Communists, and a second siege of Paris began, more 
destructive than the first. Not that the Communists 
made good fighters; they lacked the first requisites 
of the true soldier, patience and obedience; but 
though there may have been conscientious and 
patriotic spirits among them, the most of the insurgents 
were more fierce in speech than in action — less ready to 
stand fire in fair fight than to set fire to their city when 
they failed in the attempt to hold it against the lawful 



THE THIRD REPUBLIC. 393 

government. When they found they could not either 
beat the national troops or win them over to their own 
extreme views, they poured petroleum into the finest 
public buildings of Paris and laid them in ruins; 
doing more damage to the beautiful capital of their own 
country, than all it had suffered from a victorious 
foreigner's taking it by siege. 

After these disorders had been quelled, a stable 
government was established, and M. Thiers was made 
President of the French Republic for a term of years. 
Before this had expired, the opposition to his govern- 
ment forced him to resign, and Marshal Mac Mahon 
was elected in his place, (1873). The government is 
representative in its character, consisting of the Pres- 
ident, a Cabinet of ministers and a Legislature, and 
the country presents the curious anomaly of a 
Republic in which aristocratic titles are maintained 
as in the days of the Empire. 

Various attempts have been made by partisans of 
monarchy on the one hand and of military govern- 
ment on the other, to change the existing order of 
things; but to their credit be it said, the true Repub- 
licans have thus far stood firm in their principles, and 
have opposed a steady front to all attacks, showing 
neither cowardice nor violence. They have proved 
their title to command by their willingness to obey, and 
the country under them has shown a rapidity of 
recovery from the evils of war which is unexampled 
in the world's history, except in our own favored 
land. 

As an illustration of the peace and prosperity in 
which France now lives, may be mentioned the occur- 



394 HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

rence in Paris of the latest and greatest of the series 
of World's Fairs, those wonderful exhibitions of the 
industry and art of all nations. This one has been 
brilliantly successful; and just as the last pages of 
this little history are penned, comes the announcement 
of the close of the Paris Exposition of 1878. 

Now we have followed the haps and mishaps during 
a thousand years of a great nation — a loyal, brave, 
devoted, generous people. Often we have seen them 
obedient when they should have resisted, and some- 
times resisting when they should have obeyed. When 
they have borne and inflicted the most misery it has 
been through the misdirection of some of the best 
instincts of our nature — piety, loyalty, patriotism, 
courage, love of liberty. But through it all, through 
the dark days and through the bright, they have come 
to what seems to us to be a state better on the whole 
than any of the transitory conditions through which 
they have passed. 

Whatever may be the opinion of the wise as to the 
permanency of the present order of things in France, 
there can scarcely be much doubt but that while it 
does endure it is the happiest in all her national expe- 
rience. The present government is, in principle at 
least, and to a great degree in practice, one " of the 
people, by the people, for the people." The individual 
Frenchman now has a very fair chance to pursue his 
own happiness in his own way, only using his posses- 
sions so as not to injure his neighbors. 

Fortunately for her citizens, France has been 
driven away from her bad eminence as the armed 
arbiter of nations. Another now carries the hard and 



THE THIRD REPUBLIC. 395 



heavy iron gauntlet which is best fitted to grasj) the 
sword-hilt. Hers is the ungloved hand that is light, 
strong and free to hold the plouf^h or the pen, or the 
hand of a friend. "Glory," as the Avord has been 
understood, she has turned her back upon. That 
bleak and sterile height to which one man in a million 
may climb over the crushed hopes of his fellows, has 
little place in the plan of a free country. The only 
dominion the French republic can properly strive for 
is the dominion over the forces of nature, that the sum 
of human happiness may be increased ; over igno- 
rance, that error may be lessened ; then her honor 
and glory will be real, because it will be the honor 
and glory of God and humanity. 



/ 



LIST OF KINGS. 



397 



LIST OF KIH"GS. 



MEROVINGIANS. 






Clovis, 


481- 


- 511 


Later Kings, .... 


511- 


- 752 


CARLO VINGIANS. 






Pepin (the Short), 


752- 


- 768 


Charlemagne, .... 


. 768- 


- 814 


Louis (the Good-natured), . 


814 


- 840 


Charles I. (the Bald), . 


. 840- 


- 877 


Louis II. (the Stammerer), . 


877- 


- 879 


Louis III. and Carloman, 


. 879- 


- 884 


Charles II. (the Fat), 


884- 


- 892 


Charles III. (the Simple), 


. 892- 


- 936 


Louis IV. (d'Outremer), 


936- 


- 954 


LOTHAIRE, 


. 954- 


- 986 


Louis V. (the Do-nothing), . 


986- 


- 987 


CAPETIANS. 






Hugh Capet, .... 


987- 


- 996 


Robert (the Pious), 


. 996- 


-1031 


Henry L, . . 


1031- 


-1060 


Philip L, 


. 1060- 


-1108 


Louis VI. (the Fat), . 


1108- 


-1137 


Louis VIT. (the Young), 


. 1137- 


-1180 


Philip II. (Augustus), 


1180- 


-1223 


Louis VIII. (the Lion), 


. 1223- 


-1226 


Louis IX. (Saint Louis), . 


1226- 


-1270 



HISTORY OF FRANCE. 



Philip III. (the Bold), . 
Philip IV. (the Fair), 
Louis X. (the Quarreler), 
Philip Y. (the Long), 
Charles IV. (the Fair), 

Philip VI. (of Valois)^ 
John (the Good), . 
Chaeles V. (the Wise), 
Charles VL (the Well-beloved) 
Charles VII. (the Victorious), 
Louis XL, .... 

w <j Charles VIII. (the Courteous), . 
Louis XII. (the Father of his People) 
Francis I. (d'Angouleme), 
Henry IL, . . \ 
Francis IL, 
Charles IX., 
Henry III., 
Henry IV., 
Louis XIII. , . 
Louis XIV., 
Louis XV., 
Louis XVL, 
The First Republic, 
The Consulate, . 
The First Empire, . 

Louis XVIIL, . 
Charles X., . 
Louis Philippe, 
The Second Republic, 
The Second Empire, . 
The Third Republic, 



S w 




1270- 
1285- 
1314- 
1316- 
1322- 
1328- 
1350- 
1364- 
1380- 
1422- 
1461- 
1483- 
1498- 
1515- 
1547- 
1559- 
1560- 
1574- 

1589- 
1610- 
1643- 

1715- 
1774- 
1793- 
1799- 
1804- 
1814- 
1824- 
1830- 
1848- 
1852- 
1870- 



-1285 
-1314 
-1316 
-1322 
-1328 
-1350 
-1364 
-1380 
-1422 
-1461 
-1483 
-1498 
-1515 
-1547 
-1559 
-1560 
-1574 
-1589 

-1610 
-1643 
-1715 

-1774 
-1793 
-1799 
-1804 
-1814 
-1824 
-1830 
-1848 
-1852 
-1870 



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